"
Interstate Love Song" is a song by the
AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
rockRock music is a genre of popular music that entered the mainstream in the 1960s. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, rhythm and blues, country music and also drew on folk music, jazz and classical music....
band
Stone Temple PilotsStone Temple Pilots, often abbreviated to STP, is an American rock band consisting of Scott Weiland , brothers Robert and Dean DeLeo , and Eric Kretz . The band found immediate success with the release of their debut album Core in 1992, which was certified 8× platinum by the RIAA...
, from their second studio album
PurplePurple is the second album released by the American alternative rock band Stone Temple Pilots, on June 7, 1994 on Atlantic Records. It spawned three singles — "Big Empty", "Vasoline", and "Interstate Love Song" — and two promotional singles...
, released in 1994. The song, considered to be one of the band's biggest hits, hit number one on the
Mainstream Rock TracksHot Mainstream Rock Tracks is a ranking in Billboard magazine of the most-played songs on mainstream rock radio stations, a category that includes stations that play primarily rock music. Modern rock stations are counted in the Alternative Songs chart.This chart began with the March 21, 1981 issue...
chart on September 17, 1994. The song it replaced at number one was "
Vasoline"Vasoline" is a song by the band Stone Temple Pilots from their second album Purple. The song was the second single of the album , reaching #1 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Tracks chart for two weeks...
", also by Stone Temple Pilots. The song stayed at number one for 15 weeks, a record at the time. In 2003, "Interstate Love Song" was featured on the greatest hits compilation
Thank YouThank You is a greatest hits collection released by the American alternative rock band Stone Temple Pilots on November 11, 2003 on Atlantic Records...
.
"
Interstate Love Song" is a song by the
AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
rockRock music is a genre of popular music that entered the mainstream in the 1960s. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, rhythm and blues, country music and also drew on folk music, jazz and classical music....
band
Stone Temple PilotsStone Temple Pilots, often abbreviated to STP, is an American rock band consisting of Scott Weiland , brothers Robert and Dean DeLeo , and Eric Kretz . The band found immediate success with the release of their debut album Core in 1992, which was certified 8× platinum by the RIAA...
, from their second studio album
PurplePurple is the second album released by the American alternative rock band Stone Temple Pilots, on June 7, 1994 on Atlantic Records. It spawned three singles — "Big Empty", "Vasoline", and "Interstate Love Song" — and two promotional singles...
, released in 1994. The song, considered to be one of the band's biggest hits, hit number one on the
Mainstream Rock TracksHot Mainstream Rock Tracks is a ranking in Billboard magazine of the most-played songs on mainstream rock radio stations, a category that includes stations that play primarily rock music. Modern rock stations are counted in the Alternative Songs chart.This chart began with the March 21, 1981 issue...
chart on September 17, 1994. The song it replaced at number one was "
Vasoline"Vasoline" is a song by the band Stone Temple Pilots from their second album Purple. The song was the second single of the album , reaching #1 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Tracks chart for two weeks...
", also by Stone Temple Pilots. The song stayed at number one for 15 weeks, a record at the time. In 2003, "Interstate Love Song" was featured on the greatest hits compilation
Thank YouThank You is a greatest hits collection released by the American alternative rock band Stone Temple Pilots on November 11, 2003 on Atlantic Records...
. In early 2008, "Interstate Love Song" was made available as
downloadable contentDownloadable content is a form of digital media distributed through the Internet. The phrase is used to refer specifically to content created for video games that is released separately from the main video game release...
for the
music video gameA music video game, also commonly known as a music game, is a video game where the gameplay is meaningfully and often almost entirely oriented around the player's interactions with a musical score or individual songs...
series
Rock BandRock Band is a music video game developed by Harmonix Music Systems, published by MTV Games and Electronic Arts. It is the first title in the Rock Band series. The PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions were released in the United States on November 20, 2007, while the PlayStation 2 version was...
. In 2009, it was named the 58
th best hard rock song of all time by
VH1VH1 is an American cable television network based in New York City...
.
Background, recording and release
Bassist
Robert DeLeoRobert Emile DeLeo is an American bass player and harmony vocalist for the rock band Stone Temple Pilots. He has also played in Talk Show and Army of Anyone...
brought in a song he had been working on when Stone Temple Pilots convened at Cole Rehearsal Studios in Hollywood, California in March 1992. His brother, guitarist
Dean DeLeoDean DeLeo is an American guitarist for the rock band Stone Temple Pilots.He is also known for his role in the short-lived bands Talk Show and Army of Anyone, which featured his younger brother Robert DeLeo, Filter frontman Richard Patrick, and session drummer Ray Luzier...
, said, "We were in Atlanta touring
CoreCore is the debut album by the American rock band Stone Temple Pilots, released on September 29, 1992 through Atlantic Records. The album, which peaked at #3 on the Billboard 200, has been certified 8x platinum by the RIAA, making it STP's best-selling album...
, and Robert was playing around with the chords and the melody in a hotel room. I had a feeling about that song immediately." Robert DeLeo stated it was originally a
bossa novaBossa nova is a style of Brazilian music popularized by Antônio Carlos Jobim, Vinicius de Moraes and João Gilberto. Bossa nova acquired a large following, initially by young musicians and college students...
song when he began writing it. When he played it for singer
Scott WeilandScott Weiland is an American musician, lyricist, and vocalist, most notably known for his work with Grammy Award-winning rock band Stone Temple Pilots, and also for his five-year career with supergroup Velvet Revolver. After a five-year hiatus, the STP reunion tour kicked off at the Rock on the...
, the vocalist started humming along and turned what was originally the melody for the song's intro into a chorus melody.
Stone Temple Pilots recorded the song during sessions for
Purple at the Southern Tracks studio in
Atlanta, GeorgiaAtlanta is the capital and most populous city in the state of Georgia, as well as the urban core of one of the fastest-growing metropolitan areas in the United States....
. Weiland was able to complete his vocals for the song in one or two takes.
Upon its release as a single, "Interstate Love Song" reached number one on the
Billboard Mainstream Rock TracksHot Mainstream Rock Tracks is a ranking in Billboard magazine of the most-played songs on mainstream rock radio stations, a category that includes stations that play primarily rock music. Modern rock stations are counted in the Alternative Songs chart.This chart began with the March 21, 1981 issue...
chart, where it stayed for fifteen weeks. The song also reached number two on the
Modern Rock TracksAlternative Songs is a music chart in the United States that has appeared in Billboard magazine since September 10, 1988. It lists the 40 most-played songs on modern rock radio stations, most of which are alternative rock songs...
chart and number 22 on the Top 40 Mainstream.
Composition
The song features a memorable opening guitar riff, containing a sound very reminiscent of the alternative music scene of the time. It also has a notably country-western or
Southern rockSouthern rock is a subgenre of rock music, and genre of country music. It developed in the Southern United States from rock and roll, country music, and blues, and is focused generally on electric guitar and vocals.-1950s and 1960s – origins:...
feel to it, reflective of the "leaving on a Southern train" lyrics.
According to Weiland, the song dealt lyrically with a number of themes, particularly "honesty, lack of honesty, my new relationship with
heroinHeroin, or diacetylmorphine , also known as diamorphine , is a semi-synthetic opioid drug synthesized from morphine, a derivative of the opium poppy. It is the 3,6-diacetyl ester of morphine...
." At the time he was having relationship troubles with his girlfriend, as he was using heroin while recording
Purple but told her he no longer was.
Music video
The music video, directed by
Kevin KerslakeKevin Kerslake is an American music video director. He has directed videos for Stone Temple Pilots, Filter, R.E.M., 311, Faith No More, Green Day, The Used, Depeche Mode, The Smashing Pumpkins, Papa Roach, Nirvana, Rise Against, The Offspring, and Blue October, as well as several other bands.His...
, has a washed-out color effect throughout the majority of the video and features a long-nosed protagonist escaping from an unseen pursuer. A reason for this long nose could be that the protagonist lies like
PinocchioThe Adventures of Pinocchio is a novel for children by Italian author Carlo Collodi. The first half was originally a serial between 1881 and 1883, and then later completed as a book for children in February 1883. It is about the mischievous adventures of Pinocchio , an animated marionette, and...
whose nose also grows when he lies. This is probably just to emphasize the lying that Weiland sings of in the video by making the protagonist nose longer. At the beginning of the video, an early 1900s
silent filmA silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound, especially spoken dialogue. The idea of combining motion pictures with recorded sound is nearly as old as film itself, but because of the technical challenges involved, synchronized dialogue was only made practical in the late 1920s with...
-esque clip of the pursuer and protagonist is shown.