In a 2023 interview,[1] producer Gordon Raphael explained that the song was originally written by frontman Julian Casablancas with his drum machine.

[4][5] The music video for this song largely consists of a montage of random stock footage interspersed with images of the band members performing.

It was directed by the team of Roman Coppola and Johannes Gamble (as well as an uncredited Julian Casablancas).

and Knight Rider (both of which are credited), a clip from the film Brainstorm, a commercial for the 1970 Dodge Charger 500 (scene of a woman sitting in a car), a clip from the film WarGames,[6] a less-than-2-second fragment from Emmanuelle,[7] NASA footage of the Space Shuttle Atlantis in orbit, gameplay of the 1981 Sega arcade game Turbo, the rocket engine firing of the Saturn V and an image of particle tracks in a bubble chamber (which forms the American album cover for Is This It).

Some of the stock footage was taken from the film Koyaanisqatsi, directed by Godfrey Reggio, which was presented by Francis Ford Coppola.