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Psycho Killer
Lead vocals: Man
Taal: Engels
Psycho Killer is een single van de Amerikaanse postpunkgroep Talking Heads. Het nummer is afkomstig van het debuutalbum Talking Heads: 77 uit 1977 en werd de eerste hit van de groep; voornamelijk in Nederland en België. In december 1977 werd het nummer eerst in de VS en Canada op single uitgebracht. In maart 1978 volgden Europa, Australië en Nieuw-Zeeland.
"Psycho Killer" is a song by American rock band Talking Heads, released on their debut studio album Talking Heads: 77 (1977). The group first performed it as the Artistics in 1974.
The band also recorded an acoustic version of the song featuring Arthur Russell on cello. In the liner notes for Once in a Lifetime: The Best of Talking Heads (1992), Jerry Harrison wrote of the B-side of the single, "I'm glad we persuaded Tony [Bongiovi] and Lance [Quinn] that the version with the cellos shouldn't be the only one."
The band's "signature debut hit" features lyrics that seem to represent the thoughts of a serial killer. Originally written and performed as a ballad, "Psycho Killer" became what AllMusic calls a "deceptively funky new wave/no wave song" with "an insistent rhythm, and one of the most memorable, driving basslines in rock & roll."
"Psycho Killer" was the only song from the album to appear on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, peaking at number 92. It reached number 32 on the Triple J Hottest 100 in 1989, and peaked at number 11 on the Dutch singles chart in 1977. The song is included in The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.