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LINDA RONSTADT’S “LONG LONG TIME” FOUND ITS WAY BACK TO OUR HEARTS
Some songs return to us at exactly the right moment. Linda Ronstadt’s “Long Long Time” was more than fifty years old when it appeared in The Last of Us, yet for many viewers it felt like a discovery. A voice from 1970 suddenly seemed to understand a love story unfolding in 2023. The song had not changed. The world around it had—and its heartbreak had room to mean something new.
When Ronstadt recorded “Long Long Time” for her album Silk Purse, she was still building a solo career after her work with the Stone Poneys. She had the kind of voice that could fill a room, but this song asked for something more difficult than sheer power. Written by Gary White, it follows someone who has loved deeply and waited faithfully without being loved in the same way. There is no dramatic betrayal to explain the pain. The other person simply cannot give back what the singer feels.
Ronstadt lets that truth settle slowly. She does not rush to the most painful words or turn every line into a grand declaration. Her voice sounds composed at first, as though she has told herself this story many times and knows exactly where it leads. Then a phrase opens up, and you can hear how much effort that composure costs her. The ache comes from the space between what she says and what she still hopes might change.
The recording became an early breakthrough for Ronstadt and earned her a Grammy nomination. But its place in her career tells only part of the story. Listeners who found it in 1970 were hearing a young singer bring unusual emotional clarity to a familiar experience. Many people know what it is to care more than the person beside them, to read meaning into a small kindness, or to keep waiting after they have begun to suspect that waiting will change nothing. “Long Long Time” gives that private experience a voice without making it sound foolish. grammy.com
That is why its appearance in the third episode of The Last of Us felt so affecting. The episode follows Bill and Frank as they build a life together in a world shaped by loss. At one point, Bill sits at a piano and sings the song. He is hesitant and exposed; Frank listens closely. The scene gives the music an intimacy that a polished performance could never supply. Later, Ronstadt’s recording carries memories of the years the two men share. Spotify
There is a beautiful tension in that choice. The song’s narrator fears loving someone who may never love them back. Bill and Frank find a love that is returned, but they cannot keep time from passing or protect one another from every hurt. Heard alongside their story, the song begins to hold more than unrequited love. It speaks to the vulnerability of loving at all: once someone matters that much, even happiness can make you afraid of what you might lose.
After the episode aired, people sought out Ronstadt’s recording in striking numbers. The sudden rise in streams showed how powerfully the scene had reached viewers, but a number cannot describe the experience of hearing her voice after the screen goes dark. Some listeners were finding her for the first time. Others were returning to a song they had carried for decades and discovering a different feeling inside it. Spotify
Ronstadt’s performance makes both kinds of listening possible. She sings with enough honesty that the words feel personal, yet leaves enough space for us to bring our own lives to them. One person hears the memory of a love that was never returned. Another hears the years spent loving someone who is now gone. Someone else hears the courage it takes to sit beside another person and let them see how deeply you feel.
In 1970, “Long Long Time” helped the world hear what Linda Ronstadt could do with a song. In The Last of Us, it helped a new audience hear what had always been there: a voice tender enough to hold hope and sorrow in the same breath.
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