"A Horse with No Name" is a song by the folk rock band America, written by Dewey Bunnell. It was the band's first and most successful single, released in late 1971. Dewey Bunnell wanted to capture the sensation of the hot, dry desert, as he remembered his childhood travels through the Arizona and New Mexico desert when his family lived at Vandenberg Air Force Base. Bunnell has explained that "A Horse with No Name" was "a metaphor for a vehicle to get away from life's confusion into a quiet, peaceful place".