I Zimbra

The lyric is based on a 1916 sound poem called "Gadji Beri Bimba" by the German poet Hugo Ball, who was a big name in the Dada art movement. The Talking Heads were steeped in art history, but it was their producer, Brian Eno, who suggested they adapt the poem to chant over the track they created using African percussion rhythms augmented by synthesizers. Eno came up with similar sounds for his 1974 album Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy). Dadaism was a literary and artistic movement developed between 1915 and 1922, born of reaction and disillusion during World War 1. In 1916 Hugo Ball founded the Cabaret Voltaire night club in Zurich. Events there proved pivotal to the spread of the movement, which aimed to question established artistic rules and values by provoking outrage. Eno, Byrne and Ball are the credited writers on the song.

This song started as an instrumental based on a form of music popular in Nigeria called highlife, mixing in elements of disco, something many rock bands were loathe to do at the time. "We were rock musicians who were looking for a way out of what had become a very predictable formula for playing and performing rock and roll," Heads drummer Chris Frantz wrote in his memoir Remain In Love. "The African music we liked had the energy and the passion of rack and roll, but with one big difference: It was not based on Chuck Berry Licks."

Robert Fripp, best known for his work in King Crimson, added guitar on this track at the suggestion of producer Brian Eno, who had worked with him on an experimental album called No Pussyfooting. Fripp had developed a method called "Frippertronics" that he used to process his guitar through effects units.