Heads Will Roll

Frontwoman Karen O told the New Musical Express January 17, 2009, with a grin: "I figured if we were going to write a dance song it should be about heads bouncing on the floor and murder and slaughter."

"Heads Will Roll" was the second single from the third Yeah Yeah Yeahs album, It's Blitz!, following "Zero." Both songs were a major stylistic shift for the band, whose first two albums were filled with guitar-fueled punkish rockers (although their breakthrough song, "Maps," from their first album, is a sensitive ballad). For It's Blitz!, guitarist Nick Zinner switched it up and made keyboards and synthesizers the lead instruments, resulting in danceable, EDM-style songs. It worked out well for the band. They didn't lose many core fans but gained many new ones. "Heads Will Roll" got more popular over time and new listeners discovered it on social media and in remixes.

The band wrote this song in the same session that produced another It's Blitz! track, "Hysteric." Nick Zinner told Billboard magazine: "That was actually one of the last songs we wrote for the record. I think we always wanted to have a guilty-pleasure dance song; that was it, really. It came quickly, and it was just fun to write. When we were over playing in Europe, it's definitely the song people are reacting the strongest to, like freaking out when we play it."