This Town Ain't Big Enough for Both of Us

About This Town Ain't Big Enough for Both of Us

"This Town Ain't Big Enough for Both of Us" is a song written by Ron Mael of the American pop group Sparks. It is the opening track on their 1974 album Kimono My House, and was the lead single from the album, reaching number 2 in the UK singles chart. This song has become the highest charting in United Kingdom, where it was two consecutive weeks, and it was held off the top spot by The Rubettes' bubblegum pop song "Sugar Baby Love". The original idea for the song was that after each verse Russell Mael would sing a movie dialogue cliché, one of which was "This town ain't big enough for the both of us". They dropped the idea of having different phrases and instead used only the one in the title. The original working title of the song was "Too Hot to Handle". An acoustic version of the song was recorded in 1985 for the B-side of the "Change" single. In 1997, Sparks recorded two new versions of the song for their album Plagiarism. The first was an orchestral reworking arranged and conducted by Tony Visconti which reinstated a verse producer Muff Winwood had cut from the original. The other was as a collaboration with Faith No More, which was released as a single and reached number 40 in the British singles chart. Winwood used distinctive Western movie-style gunshots on the recording after a suggestion from engineer Dave Hutchins. Hutchins added the sound effect after he felt the recorded track 'was missing something', sourcing the gunshots from a BBC sound effects LP 'borrowed' from his previous workplace at the corporation. more »