Take the Long Way Home
by Supertramp
- 76
- BPM
- F major
- Key
- 7B
- Camelot
- 42
- Danceability
- 22
- Acousticness
In 1980 a live version of "Take the Long Way Home," recorded in Paris, became a minor hit in various European countries. The studio original had been the third US single from Supertramp's 1979 album Breakfast in America, where it is the sixth track. There it reached number 10 on the US charts and number 4 in Canada.
Roger Hodgson wrote it. It was the last song written for the album, penned during the nine-month recording cycle. He has described the desire to go home as running both ways. On one level it is about not wanting to go home to a wife who treats a man like part of the furniture. On a deeper level, he said, it is about finding the place in a person where he feels at home, which to him is in the heart.
He also called the title a metaphor for the universal journey of self-discovery, and said the song reflects on how disappointing adult realities can weigh on the idealism of youth. Hodgson counts it among the top 10 songs he ever wrote.
Take the Long Way Home runs at 76 BPM, the tempo of soul, trip-hop and half-time hip-hop. In classical terms it sits in andante territory. A bar of 4/4 lasts 3.16 seconds, and a quarter-note delay is 789 ms. It is in F major, Camelot 7B, which shares its notes with D minor and mixes cleanly with Bb major and C major.
We use multiple sources as part of our online research for the song story including Wikipedia.