“Some strange music draws me in. Makes me come on like some heroine.”
Amazon’s epic rock ‘n roll miniseries Daisy Jones & The Six has entered the arena at last, and while viewers are joining in all the hype of the fictional superband’s own “original” music, many have noticed the opening theme song is not one you’d find on the group’s setlist. If you recognized the opening strains of the title sequence as belonging to “Dancing Barefoot,” congratulations! You have earned your “rock scholar” backstage pass. Here’s more about the song for those who may have sold off all their parents’ copies of Creem magazine.
Who wrote ‘Dancing Barefoot’?
“Dancing Barefoot” was not a piece of original music intended for the show. The rock song was written by Patti Smith and Ivan Král in 1979 and was the second single off the Patti Smith Group’s second album Wave. “We talked about wanting to kick off the series with something that represents the show but is outside the show,” showrunner Scott Neustadter told Entertainment Weekly. “That was the song that I thought would work the best. I came up with it really early and then spent the next six or seven months trying to beat it. I could never beat it. It’s too perfect.”
“Dancing Barefoot” was ranked 331 on Rolling Stone‘s list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. The song has been covered over 20 times by acts such as U2, Pearl Jam, Simple Minds, and Allison Moorer. “It’s so spot on and it’s telling the story by not telling the story,” Neustadter said. “It has a lot of drama to it. It’s a perfect TV theme song. We kept the Six songs to not be spoilers. Because they sound very different in the first episode than they do in the tenth. They have to go on that journey before you hear that sound, so that was the reason why.”
Does Riley Keough sing the title version of ‘Dancing Barefoot’?
Although Keough performs all her own vocals in the series and on the full-length album, Aurora, released by Atlantic Records last week, the original 1979 version of “Dancing Barefoot” sung by Patti Smith with the Patti Smith Group is the version used in the show’s title sequence.
New episodes of Daisy Jones & The Six premiere each Friday on Prime Video.
