Name: Why David Byrne Shows Footage Of ICE Raids When Playing "Life During Wartime" In Concert
Uploaded: 2026-03-31T16:55:02.000Z
Duration: 6 min 33 s
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My next guest is a Grammy Tony and Academy Award-winning artist who is in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

The imperative

Please welcome back to The Late Show, David Byrne.

And as I said, I just found out that you guys are friends.

How did you guys get to how did you meet?

Oh, that's an easy show for people who don't know.

You did a show on Broadway called "Oh, Hello".

it was a very that was when I tripped over his intro, and

Nick went, "You've never been nervous like this before." Yes.

And he said, "Hey, will you do this?" And of course, I did the show, and

I go, "I don't think I recognize these guys." We were in a lot of, like, arsenic and old lace makeup.

And you've been on tour with an ensemble.

Here we go with your ensemble right there.

You're always reimagining what a concert can be.

I think your imagination got the applause.

How did you decide what you wanted this tour to feel like?

It was not a sad show, but it was gray, and I thought, "No.

Times we live in, we need some color." Sure.

In the show, you perform some talking head songs, like "Psycho Killer" and "Life During Wartime." Do those songs I mean, do those songs feel different in the context of today than when you first performed them?

Well, the second one, "Life During Wartime," yes.

We have I licensed some ICE footage to show at the very end very, very end of the song.

If we showed it for the whole song, it'd be kind of depressing.

we start off with some footage that I saw of this looked like a delivery guy on a bike being chased by the ICE guys, and

We debuted that clip because they kept coming.

Like, biggest, biggest, coolest reaction I've ever seen of a live audience ever.

You've also created an immersive show at the Goodman Theater in Chicago called "Theater of the Mind." What's that about?

It's about how we form our identities through our memories and our perception, and

it follows a guide, an actor, who takes you through a series of rooms that represent various that actor's life going backwards, back into time.

And the second one, a woman was sobbing by the last room.

She told me she loved the show, but it touched something personal in her.

And so I was simultaneously kind of pleased, but also thought, "Well, can I help?

Has it generally been the reaction been positive?

I do have one of the actresses has told me a story.

These kind of immersive shows, the actor is very close, like you are to me.

And in one room, a husband and wife were in the audience, and

the husband winked at the actor, and the wife noticed.