10 Best Songs With The Word 'Leave' In The Title

Feature Photo: Birmingham Museums Trust

Sometimes one word is enough to open up an entire range of emotions, and “leave” is one of those words. These ten songs use it to talk about heartbreak, escape, independence, longing, warning, and the difficult moment when somebody finally decides to go. The music stretches from blues and hard rock to pop, folk, and orchestral Beatles balladry, but every song finds a different emotional meaning inside the same simple word.

# 10 – You Can Leave Your Hat On – Three Dog Night/Randy Newman

Three Dog Night - Coming Down Your Way - ABC Records - 1C 062-96 690

Randy Newman wrote and first recorded “You Can Leave Your Hat On” for his 1972 album Sail Away, and Three Dog Night gave the song a bigger rock treatment on 1975’s Coming Down Your Way. Newman’s lyric is playful, sensual, and a little strange, which is exactly why it has attracted so many different interpretations over the years. Three Dog Night push the arrangement harder without losing the song’s sly personality, turning a typically offbeat Newman composition into a full-bodied rock performance. It is a great way to open this list because “leave” is not about departure here at all—it becomes the one thing the narrator specifically asks someone not to take off.

Read More: Top 10 Randy Newman Songs

# 9 – If You Leave Me Now – Chicago

CHICAGO X (CLEAR GOLD VINYL/LIMITED EDITION/GATEFOLD COVER)

Chicago’s “If You Leave Me Now” became the band’s first No. 1 single on the Billboard Hot 100 and one of the defining soft-rock ballads of the 1970s. Peter Cetera wrote the song and sings the lead vocal on Chicago X, with James William Guercio producing and Jimmie Haskell providing the lush orchestration. The record was a dramatic contrast to the brass-heavy sound that had defined much of Chicago’s earlier work, but audiences responded immediately to its vulnerability and restraint. “If You Leave Me Now” also won the 1977 Grammy Award for Best Pop Vocal Performance by a Duo, Group or Chorus, making it one of the most commercially and critically important singles in the band’s history.

# 8 – Leaving Las Vegas – Sheryl Crow

Tuesday Night Music Club by Sheryl Crow (1993-08-03)

“Leaving Las Vegas” was one of the first songs to introduce Sheryl Crow’s Tuesday Night Music Club sound to a wider audience. Released from her 1993 debut album and produced by Bill Bottrell, the song grew out of the collaborative Tuesday Night Music Club sessions and took its title from John O’Brien’s novel Leaving Las Vegas. Crow sings it with a weary sense of escape, as if getting out of town is less a triumphant new beginning than the only reasonable move left. The song never became the massive pop hit that “All I Wanna Do” would become, but it remains one of the strongest examples of the loose, literate, slightly worn-down character that made Crow’s first album so distinctive.

Read More: Top 10 Sheryl Crow Songs

# 7 – Take It Or Leave It – Foghat

Fool For The City (180 Gram Emerald Green Audiophile Vinyl/Limited Anniversary Edition)

Foghat’s “Take It or Leave It” closes 1975’s Fool for the City on a much more reflective note than the album’s hard-driving classics “Slow Ride” and “Fool for the City.” Dave Peverett and Nick Jameson wrote the song, with Jameson also producing the album and handling bass, keyboards, guitar, and other studio duties during a transitional period for the band. Instead of another boogie-rock workout, the track leans into acoustic textures, synthesizers, and a slower arrangement while Peverett delivers the title as an emotional ultimatum. That change of pace gives the song real weight and makes it one of Foghat’s most underrated ballads.

# 6 – Leave Me Alone (Ruby Red Dress) – Helen Reddy

Helen Reddy - I Am Woman & Long Hard Climb [SACD Hybrid Multi-channel]

Helen Reddy’s “Leave Me Alone (Ruby Red Dress)” turns a simple repeated phrase into something surprisingly haunting. Written by Linda Laurie and released on Reddy’s 1973 album Long Hard Climb, the song tells the story of Ruby, a woman whose heartbreak and isolation have made her an outsider in the eyes of the people around her. Joe Wissert produced the recording, and Reddy’s vocal gives the repeated “leave me alone” refrain a mixture of exhaustion, anger, and sadness rather than treating it as a catchy gimmick. The single reached No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and became another major hit during Reddy’s extraordinary early-1970s run.

Read More: Top 10 Helen Reddy Songs

# 5 – Take It Or Leave It – The Rolling Stones

Aftermath (UK) - Remastered- Made In USA

Mick Jagger and Keith Richards wrote “Take It or Leave It” during the period when their songwriting was rapidly moving beyond straightforward blues and R&B. The Searchers released their version as a single in April 1966, while the Rolling Stones included their own recording on the UK edition of Aftermath later that month. Produced by Andrew Loog Oldham, the Stones version is unusually gentle by their standards, with a folk-pop arrangement carrying one of Jagger and Richards’ typically unsentimental relationship lyrics. The contrast works beautifully: the music sounds almost sweet while the title delivers the ultimatum with no room for negotiation.

# 4 – Leave A Light On – Belinda Carlisle

Belinda Carlisle’s “Leave a Light On” combines one of her strongest pop-rock vocals with a very special guest appearance from George Harrison. Rick Nowels and Ellen Shipley wrote the song for Carlisle’s 1989 album Runaway Horses, with Nowels producing, and Harrison contributes the unmistakable slide-guitar solo that lifts the record into another dimension. The single reached No. 11 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. 4 in the UK, becoming one of Carlisle’s biggest international hits. The title turns leaving into something hopeful rather than final: distance may be unavoidable, but the light left burning means there is still somewhere to come home to.

Read More: Top 10 Belinda Carlisle Songs

# 3 – You’ve Got A Habit Of Leaving – David Bowie

“You’ve Got a Habit of Leaving” captures David Bowie before he was David Bowie in the way the world would eventually know him. Recorded at IBC Studios in London in July 1965 and released under the name Davy Jones with the Lower Third, the song was produced by Shel Talmy, engineered by Glyn Johns, and featured Nicky Hopkins on piano. Its aggressive mod-rock sound clearly reflects the influence of The Who and other British bands of the moment, but you can already hear Bowie testing how far he could push his own identity. He returned to the song during the Toy sessions in 2000, and that later recording was finally officially released in 2021, giving listeners a remarkable before-and-after look at the same songwriter more than three decades apart.

Read More: 10 Best David Bowie Songs

# 2 – Leave My Girl Alone – Stevie Ray Vaughan

Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble’s “Leave My Girl Alone” is a Buddy Guy song, not a Vaughan-Doyle Bramhall composition, and Vaughan treats it with exactly the respect and intensity you would expect. His version appeared on 1989’s In Step, the final studio album released during his lifetime, produced by Jim Gaines and recorded during the period when Vaughan’s playing had gained a new clarity after getting sober. The performance is a slow-burning blues warning, with Vaughan’s vocal holding the tension while his guitar keeps pushing harder around it. Buddy Guy’s influence had always been part of Vaughan’s musical language, and this recording feels less like an imitation than one great blues guitarist carrying another great bluesman’s song forward.

Read More: Top 10 Stevie Ray Vaughan Songs

# 1 – She’s Leaving Home – The Beatles

Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Remastered) (CD)

“She’s Leaving Home” closes this list with one of the most heartbreaking stories Paul McCartney and John Lennon ever put on a Beatles album. Released on 1967’s Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, the song has McCartney singing the young woman’s story while Lennon answers from the parents’ point of view in the chorus. Mike Leander arranged the small string ensemble, and none of the four Beatles plays an instrument on the recording, allowing the voices and orchestration to carry the entire drama. The song turns leaving into something neither completely tragic nor completely liberating: the daughter needs a life of her own, while the parents are left trying to understand how everything they thought they had provided was still not enough.