Carefree Highway (song)
| "Carefree Highway" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Single by Gordon Lightfoot | ||||
| from the album Sundown | ||||
| B-side | "Seven Island Suite" | |||
| Released | August 1974 | |||
| Genre | Folk, Country Rock | |||
| Length | 3:45 | |||
| Label | Reprise | |||
| Writer(s) | Gordon Lightfoot | |||
| Producer(s) | Lenny Waronker | |||
| Gordon Lightfoot singles chronology | ||||
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"Carefree Highway" is a song written by Gordon Lightfoot and was second single release from his 1974 album, Sundown. The song peaked at #10 on the Billboard Hot 100 and spent one week at #1 on the Easy Listening chart in October 1974.[1]
The song's name comes from the name of Arizona State Route 74 north of Phoenix: Lightfoot - "I thought it would make a good title for a song. I wrote it down, put it in my suitcase and it stayed there for eight months."[2] The song employs "Carefree Highway" as a metaphor for the state of mind where the singer seeks escape from his ruminations over a long ago failed affair with a woman named Ann. Lightfoot has stated that Ann actually was the name of a woman Lightfoot romanced when he was age 22:[2] "It [was] one of those situations where you meet that one woman who knocks you out and then leaves you standing there and says she's on her way."[3]
Chart performance
| Chart (1974) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| Australian Kent Music Report | 74[4] |
| Canadian RPM Top Singles | 11[5] |
| Canadian RPM Adult Contemporary | 1[6] |
| Canadian RPM Country Tracks | 1[7] |
| U.S. Billboard Hot 100 | 10 |
| U.S. Billboard Easy Listening | 1 |
| U.S. Billboard Hot Country Singles | 81 |
| Preceded by "Stop and Smell the Roses" by Mac Davis |
Billboard Easy Listening Singles number-one single by Gordon Lightfoot October 19, 1974 |
Succeeded by "Back Home Again" by John Denver |
| Preceded by "I Honestly Love You" by Olivia Newton-John |
RPM Country Tracks number-one single November 30, 1974 |
Succeeded by "Country Is" by Tom T. Hall |
References
- ↑ Whitburn, Joel (2002). Top Adult Contemporary: 1961-2001. Record Research. p. 146.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Crawdaddy (April 1975). Missing or empty
|title=(help); - ↑ http://www.lightfoot.ca/songnote.htm
- ↑ Kent, David (1993). Australian Chart Book 1970–1992. Australian Chart Book. ISBN 0-646-11917-6.
- ↑ "RPM Top Singles for November 23, 1974". RPM. Retrieved 11 October 2010.
- ↑ "RPM Adult Contemporary for October 12, 1974". RPM. Retrieved 11 October 2010.
- ↑ "RPM Country Tracks for November 30, 1974". RPM. Retrieved 11 October 2010.
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