Songfacts®:

• You don't often get a song that sounds like it crawled out of a cornfield at midnight, but "Walking With A Killer," Kim Deal's first solo single, does just that. Released in late 2012 as a limited edition 7-inch vinyl, this moody little number quietly announced that Deal - still technically a member of Pixies at the time - was ready to walk her own path. The pressing was limited to just 1,000 copies, making it a prized possession among Deal devotees and eBay vinyl hunters alike.
• Deal debuted the song live at the All Tomorrow's Parties "Nightmare Before Christmas" festival in the UK in December 2012. Then, on June 14, 2013, it became official: Deal left the Pixies, closing a turbulent chapter and shifting her full attention to her solo work and her other beloved band, The Breeders.
• In interviews, Deal has traced the song's chilling mood back to an incident in Huber Heights, a suburb of her hometown of Dayton, Ohio - a place she once described with characteristic dry wit as "home of serial killers and presidents." (She's not wrong: Ohio has birthed seven US presidents and more than a few creeps who made national headlines for all the wrong reasons.)
• One night while sneaking out for cigarettes, Deal was harassed by a group of men in a van who leaned out the window and shouted "rape victim" at her.
  
  "The scary roads, the cornfields," she recalled to Mojo magazine, "that's an element of the song, to set the stage for what can go wrong." That single terrifying moment became the song's haunting heartbeat.
• Musically, "Walking With A Killer" is signature Kim Deal: understated, eerie, and entirely her own. The track blends lo-fi alt-rock with noir storytelling, creating something closer to a whispered warning than a scream.
• "Walking With A Killer" got a second life in 2018 when Deal re-recorded it with The Breeders' classic lineup for their album All Nerve. This version helped spark the reunion and recording of the album, as the band found renewed energy and inspiration in playing the song together.