Go Home (song)

1985 single by Stevie Wonder

"Go Home"

Single by Stevie Wonder

from the album In Square Circle

B-side

"Instrumental"

Released

October 1985

Recorded

1985

Genre

R&B
dance-pop
funk

Length

5:18 (album version)
4:18 (7" version)
9:22 (12" version)

Label

Tamla

Songwriter(s)

Stevie Wonder

Producer(s)

Stevie Wonder

Stevie Wonder singles chronology

"That's What Friends Are For"
(1985)

"Go Home"
(1985)

"Overjoyed"
(1986)

"Go Home" is a song by Stevie Wonder, released as the second single from his twentieth studio album, In Square Circle (1985). The song showcased the narrator's plea to a young woman to go home, though the girl tries to get the narrator to stay with her. In the US, the song peaked at #2 on the Billboard R&B chart and #10 on the Billboard Hot 100 and, to date, is Wonder's last song to reach the US top ten on the Hot 100.^[1] "Go Home" also topped both the Billboard dance chart and the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart.^[2]^[3]

Stevie performed this song as early as the May 7, 1983, episode of Saturday Night Live and nearly two years later at the 1985 Grammy Awards ceremony in Los Angeles, California, in a synthesizer jam with other contemporaries Howard Jones, Herbie Hancock, and Thomas Dolby.^[4] Like "Part-Time Lover," the song was released with a special 12-inch version, which demonstrated Wonder's ability to reverse-sample.

Billboard called it a "darker follow up" to "Part-Time Lover" that is "more subtle and affecting."^[5]

Personnel

Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, background vocal, synthesizers, drums, vocoder
Bob Malach – saxophone
Larry Gittens - trumpet

Charts

Weekly charts

Chart (1985–1986)	Peak position
Australia (Kent Music Report)^[6]	92
Belgium (Ultratop 50 Flanders)	25
Canada (RPM)	31
Finland (Suomen virallinen lista)^[7]	16
UK Singles (OCC)	67
US Billboard Hot 100	10
US R&B Singles (Billboard)	2
US Hot Adult Contemporary (Billboard)	1
US Cash Box Top 100^[8]	12

Year-end charts

Chart (1986)	Rank
US Billboard Hot 100^[9]	100

Cover versions

Instrumental group Groovopolis, led by guitarist Chris Cortez, covered the song for their self-titled first and only album in 2002.^[10]^[11]

References

^ Whitburn, Joel (2004). Top R&B/Hip-Hop Singles: 1942-2004. Record Research. p. 636.
^ Whitburn, Joel (2004). Hot Dance/Disco: 1974-2003. Record Research. p. 283.
^ Whitburn, Joel (2002). Top Adult Contemporary: 1961-2001. Record Research. p. 263.
^ YouTube: "Synthesizer Medley at the 1985 Grammys"
^ "Reviews". Billboard. November 16, 1985. p. 67. Retrieved 2022-08-02.
^ "Top 100 Singles". Top100singles.net. Retrieved 2021-05-23.
^ Pennanen, Timo (2021). "Stevie Wonder". Sisältää hitin - 2. laitos Levyt ja esittäjät Suomen musiikkilistoilla 1.1.1960–30.6.2021 (PDF) (in Finnish). Helsinki: Kustannusosakeyhtiö Otava. p. 284. Retrieved 14 July 2022.
^ "Cash Box Top 100 Singles – Week ending February 8, 1986". Cash Box Magazine. 8 February 1986. Archived from the original on 2 October 2012. Retrieved 17 April 2018.
^ "Top 100 Hits of 1986/Top 100 Songs of 1986". Musicoutfitters.com. Retrieved 2018-04-17.
^ "Groovopolis overview". Allmusic.com.
^ "Jazz Improv". ChrisCortez.net. Archived from the original on 2010-05-26. Retrieved 2010-06-30.