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Song

"A Thousand Miles" is a pop song written by American singer Vanessa Carlton for her debut album, Be Not Nobody. It was co-produced and co-arranged by Carlton and Ron Fair, and was released as the album's first single in 2002 (see 2002 in music). It became Carlton's breakthrough hit and one of the most popular songs of the year.

About the record

The song is a piano-driven pop ballad supported by a full orchestral arrangement, in which its protagonist (Carlton) pines for her lover, from whom she has separated. She admits "I need you and I miss you...you know I'd walk a thousand miles if I could just see you". Carlton said that she wrote the song about somebody that she had a crush on, but admitted that he was unaware of her unreciprocated feelings for him. She has also called the song "a combination of reality and fantasy. It's about a love that so consumes you that you do anything for it. That's how I felt at that time".

Billboard magazine opined "it's the song's classical-tied piano hook that endures with urgency throughout the song that lends it spectacular charm, along with the artist's vulnerable vocal style...A truly auspicious opening". Most other critics gave Be Not Nobody mixed reviews, but generally praised the song. All Music Guide wrote: "as it moves from its solo piano opening to bombastic orchestral-backed choruses, the result isn't overwhelming, it's sweet, multi-layered, and appealing". Rolling Stone commended Carlton's tendency to keep the song "busy with classical flourishes, rich voicings and harmonies reminiscent of Tori Amos", and included her on their "Top 10 Artists To Watch in 2002" list. Adrien Begrand of PopMatters magazine characterised the song as "the sort of girly-voiced, introspective pop that is made to please people who are looking for singer/songwriters who look and sound profound, but actually have nothing to say. However, it's catchy and hard to dislike".

Composition and recording

Carlton wrote the song's piano riff in the summer of 1998, at her parents' house in Philadelphia; her mother, who had been listening to her, said "Vanessa, that's a hit song". However, Carlton was unable to finish the song due to a case of writer's block and did not return to it for several months. While looking for a record label that would sign her, Carlton played the beginning of the song for a record producer, who said "You have to finish that". She returned to her parents' home and finished it in an hour one evening, naming it "Interlude".

Some years later, Carlton recorded a demo tape (which featured several tracks, including "Interlude") and sent it to various producers and labels in the hopes that she would be signed by one of them. Some expressed interest, but Carlton did not agree with their suggestions for alternative titles for the song. One of the tapes found its way to Ron Fair, head of A&M Records, who recalled that "it was extraordinary, but also in some respects kind of screwed up as a record. It didn't press the emotional buttons the way I envisioned it". Carlton was flown in by Fair, who sat down with her for a piano session to alter the arrangement of the song, "so the heartbeat came in a different way" Fair said.

During the session, more time signatures and transitions were inserted into the song by Fair, and the timing of the repetition of the chorus was changed. Additionally, the instrumental opening was made shorter and an orchestra section was added by Fair; the lyrics, however, remained the same. He explained: "It has a lot of starts and stops to it, which makes it hard to achieve a flow, but I wanted to make a really dramatic record. The song is like a mini musical of its own". The song took fourteen sessions to record, and was the first to be recorded for Be Not Nobody. The orchestra performing the song was conducted by Fair, and he also organised a small band for its recording: guitarist John Goux played guitar on the track, Lee Sklar played bass guitar, and Abe Laboriel Jr. played drums. Carlton later said: "after listening to it I realized I was going to make an album that I was very proud of".

The selection of the song's title was accompanied by a minor disagreement between Fair and Carlton, who was reportedly "adamant" about about changing it. Said Fair, "Vanessa Carlton is an incredible talent, but she's also very stubborn...I had to say, 'Look, I'm the president of the label, we're not calling it "Interlude". ' When you're trying to launch a career, people need a handle to pick things up from, and the word 'Interlude' is never in the song". In its finished form, the song was first heard during a scene in the Reese Witherspoon film Legally Blonde (2001), and was featured on the film's soundtrack under the title "A Thousand Miles (Interlude)". The final title of the song, "A Thousand Miles", was based on a suggestion by Fair's nephew. Following its completion, Fair said that he listened to the song repeatedly and "it made me weep. That's usually my litmus test. If I cry, I know it's a hit".

Despite this, he was concerned that the song's piano basis would put it at a disadvantage in the marketplace if it was to be released as a single. Fair played "A Thousand Miles" in front of Jimmy Iovine, the co-chairman of Interscope, Geffen and A&M Records and Fair's superior. Iovine was very impressed with the song, and requested that a music video be filmed immediately for it. After the video had been completed, it was presented by Fair to Tom Calderone, the Vice President of Programming for MTV, in early 2002. Calderone expressed a desire to begin broadcasting the video at once and Fair agreed to his request, even though the album was still in production at the time and Carlton's marketing "image" had not yet been developed.

Promotion and chart performance

In the U.S., "A Thousand Miles" was released as a CD single – with a live version of "Twilight", another track from Be Not Nobody – on February 12, and peaked at number five on the Billboard Hot 100 during late May and early June; it remained within the top forty from March until October. The Be Not Nobody album was released on April 30 and – partly due to the popularity of "A Thousand Miles" – debuted within the U.S. top five with first week sales of over 100,000 copies. The single was successful on several other Billboard formats and topped the ARC Weekly Top 40 for four weeks in June, becoming the biggest hit of the year on that chart. It was 2002's sixth most-played single on U.S. radio, and sold well in other countries (where it was promoted and released over the summer months). It was a top five hit in France, and managed to reach the top ten in other parts of Europe such as the United Kingdom, Italy and the Netherlands. It was most popular in Australia, where it became the sixth most successful single of the year and held the number one position on the ARIA Singles Chart for two weeks, from August 11 to August 24. It replaced a Junkie XL remix of "A Little Less Conversation" by Elvis Presley, and was itself replaced by Avril Lavigne's "Complicated". It also reached the top twenty in Japan and Germany. E! Online said the song was "a bona fide hit for good reason. Catchy pop on the surface, it has melodic complexity beneath that bodes well for repeated listening".

Carlton told ContactMusic.com of the first time she watched the single's music video, in which she is seen playing the piano whilst travelling through a variety of settings:

"I was in the studio and had just taken a break, when someone ran in the room and said, 'you're on MTV!' We put it on and I just stared at the screen. After a few minutes, I just covered my eyes and started to laugh. It seemed so surreal. The night after that, I heard the song on the radio for the first time. It was all so unbelievable".

It received heavy airplay on the channel following its premiere on the top ten video show Total Request Live in early January, and was popular enough to be retired from the show's countdown on June 5, when the song was still high on the charts. There was speculation that bluescreen techniques had been utilised during its creation, but it was "100 percent real", according to Carlton. Carlton also felt that Marc Klasfeld (the video's director) "captured who I was in that video", and he was selected to directed the video for the album's follow-up single, "Ordinary Day".

Both the album and single were given substantial promotion on the internet. AOL Music reported that a twenty minute selection of video content involving Carlton that the website had hosted, including the "A Thousand Miles" video and Carlton's performance of the song for Sessions@AOL, drew over one million requested downloads and streams prior to the release of Be Not Nobody. The Sessions recording of "A Thousand Miles" was later included on the album Sessions @ AOL, released in October 2003. The single version of the song is featured on the hits compilation Now That's What I Call Music! Vol. 10 in the U.S., and the fifty-third volume of the NOW! series in the UK.

Legacy

"A Thousand Miles" was nominated for two Grammy Awards: Record of the Year and Song of the Year, losing both to Norah Jones' "Don't Know Why".

"A Thousand Miles" became popular amongst U.S. troops serving in Iraq (see 2003 Invasion of Iraq), and in April 2003 the Chicago Sun-Times reported that it had become the most requested song on the radio station BFBS Middle East. Carlton responded by saying: "Perhaps, 'A Thousand Miles' conveys the feelings and longing and desperation that the U.S. soldiers feel for their loved ones. I don't know. But whatever peace I am able to bring to the hearts of the people at war is a contribution that I am proud of".

A November 2004 review in the Village Voice compared the song's enduring popularity to the Beatles' "I Am the Walrus" (1967), describing it as "a ditty whose 'If I could fall into the sky/Do you think time would pass me by?' might be her generation's 'Sitting on a cornflake/Waiting for the van to come'". Hip hop musician Kanye West said of "A Thousand Miles", which he included on his iTunes celebrity playlist, that "this must be the white song that all black people like". The song was given a similar description by an African-American character in the comedy film White Chicks (2004): posing as a white teenage heiress, he refers to it as "like, the whitest song ever", while the girls who are listening to it with him declare it their "jam".

A writer for the Boston Phoenix said that with the song, Carlton "won favor with smart but awkward teenage girls who didn’t see themselves in more evidently constructed teen-pop personalities like Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera".

Track listings

• U.S. CD single

1. "A Thousand Miles" – 3:59
2. "Twilight" (live) – 4:07

Charts

Chart (2002)	Position
U.S. Billboard Hot 100	5
U.S. Adult Contemporary	1 (7 weeks)
U.S. ARC Weekly Top 40	1 (4 weeks)
Australian ARIA Singles Chart	1 (2 weeks)
Brazil Singles Chart	8
France Singles Chart	5
Germany Singles Chart	14
Netherlands Singles Chart	6
Japan Singles Chart	15
Italy Singles Chart	6
UK Singles Chart	6
Europe Official Top 100	9
Chart (2003)	Position
U.S. Adult Contemporary	1
U.S. Adult Top 40	2
Chart (2004)	Position
U.S. Top 40 Adult Recurrents	1

Credits

• Vocals and piano – Vanessa Carlton
• Drums – Abe Laboriel Jr.
• Guitar – John Goux
• Bass – Leland Sklar
• Vibes, organ and harmonica – Ron Fair
• Luis Conte – percussion

References

• [14]
• [15]
• [16]
• [17]
• [18]
• [19]
• [20]

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