Heart of Gold
by Neil Young
- 86
- BPM
- E minor
- Key
- 9A
- Camelot
- 55
- Danceability
- 19
- Acousticness
On April 8, 1972, "Heart of Gold" reached number 1 on the RPM national singles chart in Canada, the same date Neil Young held the top spot on both the singles and albums charts. It hit number 1 again on May 13. In the United States it was his only number 1 single, and Billboard ranked it the 17th song of 1972.
A back injury shaped the sound. Young could not stand for long periods. He put down the electric guitar and returned to an acoustic one he could play sitting down. He also played harmonica in the three instrumental sections. The recording was made on February 6 to 8, 1971, at Quadrafonic Sound Studios in Nashville, during the first sessions for Harvest. Linda Ronstadt and James Taylor were in town to appear on Johnny Cash's television program, and the producer, Elliot Mazer, had them sing backup.
Success bothered Young. In the liner notes to Decade he wrote that the song put him in the middle of the road, that traveling there got boring, and that he headed for the ditch, where the people were more interesting. Bob Dylan said in 1985 that he hated hearing it on the radio in 1972, because it sounded like him.
Heart of Gold runs at 86 BPM, the tempo of boom-bap hip-hop, reggae and slow R&B. In classical terms it sits in andante territory. A bar of 4/4 lasts 2.79 seconds, and a quarter-note delay is 698 ms. It is in E minor, Camelot 9A, which shares its notes with G major and mixes cleanly with A minor and B minor.
We use multiple sources as part of our online research for the song story including Wikipedia.