"Editorial abstract illustration evoking the emotional arc of a song titled "Take This Longing" by Leonard Cohen. Modest rise and fall. balanced composition. Mood: contemplative, emotional, introspective, melancholy, romantic. Visual style: 1970s editorial print aesthetic, sun-faded color. Painterly, grainy film texture, muted palette with strategic accent colors. The composition should read left-to-right like a timeline — calm on one side, intensifying toward the other. Strictly no faces, no text, no logos, no literal objects, no band imagery. Pure color-field abstraction with emotional weight. 16:9 editorial format."
Deep calm, gentler than 92% of our 19,209 measured songs — measures out best for focus.
60
BPM
Take This Longing by Leonard Cohen is 60 BPM — Adagio (slow).
Half-time 30 BPM · Double-time 120 BPM · released 1971
Fan image for "Take This Longing"
An abstract illustration of what this song feels like. Each image is built from a prompt — the text description fed to the image generator. Listeners submit their own prompts, upvote the ones that fit best, and the top-voted prompt drives the next regeneration. After 100 image votes, we make a new picture.
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Song DNA
Notes: Gentle, introspective vocal delivery with sparse instrumentation creates an intimate, vulnerable atmosphere. The repetitive chant-like chorus provides a meditative, almost hypnotic quality.
Misophonia Triggers
Recommended for: deep listening emotional release meditation relaxation
An unrequited love song where Cohen pleads for relief from his yearning for Nico through repetitive, poetic verses about longing and devotion.
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Moods: contemplative, emotional, introspective, melancholy, romantic
Traditions: art rock, folk, singer-songwriter
At a glance
"Take This Longing" by Leonard Cohen
60 BPM, dynamic range 5/10, smooth texture, soft vocals. Sits in the middle band — neither built for stillness nor pitched at workout intensity. Whether it works for a given moment depends more on mood and lyrical content than on the acoustic profile. The full sensory breakdown follows.
How this song sits on each sensory axis
A dynamic range of 5/10 is within the normal pop-mix band. There is variation between verse and chorus, but it's the kind of variation most listeners encounter routinely.
Sudden changes: none. Transitions are musically signaled — nothing will surprise you if you're only half-listening.
Texture: smooth.
Predictability is high — the song telegraphs what it will do next. A sensory-sensitive listener can usually guess where it's going without close attention.
Vocal style: soft vocals.
Where this sits in Leonard Cohen's catalog
We have 51 songs from Leonard Cohen in the library. Of those, 32 are rated Safe, 18 Moderate, and 1 Intense. This song's dynamic range of 5/10 sits above the artist average of 4.3, making it the #12 most dynamic track of theirs in our library.
Other tracks from Songs of Love and Hate
We have 2 songs from this album. Overall, the album leans moderate in sensory profile.
- Famous Blue Raincoat — moderate DR 4
1971 context
Released in 1971. We have 257 songs from that year in our library, averaging a dynamic range of 6.2/10. This track is quieter / less dynamic than the year average. Explore more from the 1970s.
Explore by mood and tradition
Guides that may help
Karma Police: Radiohead’s Eerie Joke About Power and Paranoia
Karma Police began as a band in-joke and became one of Radiohead’s defining songs — a queasy meditat…
How fast is "Take This Longing"?
60 BPM — Very slow (ballad / ambient)
For running
Too slow for most running; good for warm-up walks or cool-down.
For workouts
Warm-up, cool-down, yoga, stretching.
For daily life
Sleep, meditation, reading, focus work.
Browse more songs at 60 BPM.
When "Take This Longing" works, and when it doesn't
Use-case verdicts computed from the song's tempo, dynamics, and sensory profile.
~
Focus / studying
Maybe — fine for routine work, but the mid-song changes may pull attention during deep focus.
✗
Running / workout
No — 60 BPM is too slow for sustained cardio.
✗
Sleep / winding down
No — contains elements that will keep an awake nervous system engaged.
✓
Driving / road trip
Yes — predictable enough for safe driving attention, interesting enough to stay engaged.
✓
Cooking / dinner background
Yes — sits in the background without demanding attention.
✓
Emotional release / catharsis
Yes — this is a song for actively feeling what you came to feel, not for background.
Related reading
Editorial guides that cover this song's use cases, moods, or artist.
I rated every Billie Eilish album by emotional intensity
From bedroom ASMR whispers to walls of distortion — a deep sensory dive into all three Billie Eilish studio albums and what each one actuall…
I Listened to Every Radiohead Album Through a Sensory Lens — Here's What I Found
Radiohead's nine albums analyzed through dynamic range, texture, and emotional intensity — from Pablo Honey's raw stadium rock to A Moon Sha…
Nick Cave's albums ranked by emotional darkness — which one is your nervous system ready for?
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds made some of the most devastating music in rock history. But not all darkness is the same. This guide ranks his …
Why this rating
We rate this song Moderate because it falls between our Safe and Intense thresholds on at least one dimension. Moderate is the default for most well-produced music that has real arc but no surprise elements. Full rubric: methodology.
This song in the Music Studio
18/100 intensity
See how “Take This Longing” sits against your own sensitivities, or use it as a waypoint in a calmer set.
Listen on
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Rating last reviewed: 2026-04-13. Reviewed by the Music I Want editorial team against the documented methodology.
Think this rating is wrong? Contact the editor — every message is read and ratings get revised.
By the numbers: how this song compares
Computed from this song’s place among the 19,209 songs we’ve measured.
Where it sits in 19,000 songs
This sits near the calm end of everything we've measured — gentler than 92% of the 19,209 songs in the library. Its intensity reading of 18/100 comes from a dynamic range of 5/10, smooth texture, no sudden shifts, and soft vocals. Relatively few songs occupy this exact corner of the spectrum.
What makes it unusual
What stands out most about this song is a slow, unhurried pace: more extreme on that axis than 100% of everything we've measured. At the far opposite end of the library sit the songs built on full chaos — sudden changes, huge quiet-to-loud swings, and relentless energy — the kind of track this one is the counterpoint to.
Feels almost identical to
How I Made My Millions — Radiohead · 94%Wayfaring Stranger — Johnny Cash · 94%Playground Love — Air · 94%Oasis — Julie Byrne · 94%
Closest matches by feel across all 19,209 measured songs — not by genre or artist, by how they actually move.
What it’s good for
Sleep9/10
Focus10/10
Workout1/10
Dinner7/10
Party / hype1/10
Scored from this song’s tempo, intensity, dynamics and texture — not crowd votes.
1971 in context
The 257 songs we’ve measured from 1971 average a dynamic range of 6.2/10. At 5/10, this track is gentler and steadier than its year.
Mixes smoothly with
Within a few BPM and close in feel — they flow without a jarring transition.
The fingerprint
Intensity18
Dynamics44
Tempo11
Surprise0
Density0
Predictability0
Vocal force25
Trigger load38
The 8-dimension measurement behind every rating on this page.
Frequently asked about "Take This Longing"
Quick answers pulled from the song's sensory analysis.
What is the BPM of "Take This Longing" by Leonard Cohen?
"Take This Longing" by Leonard Cohen has a tempo of 60 BPM (Adagio (slow)). At half-time that is 30 BPM, and at double-time 120 BPM.
What is the sensory intensity of "Take This Longing" by Leonard Cohen?
"Take This Longing" by Leonard Cohen rates as Moderate intensity. Dynamic range 5/10, none sudden changes, smooth texture. Moderate is the default for well-produced music with real arc but no surprise elements.
How loud is "Take This Longing" — what is its dynamic range?
"Take This Longing" has a dynamic range of 5/10. Within normal pop-mix variation. Movement between verse and chorus but nothing dramatic.
Does "Take This Longing" have sudden or surprising changes?
No. "Take This Longing" has no sudden unsignaled changes. Every transition is musically telegraphed.
What is "Take This Longing" best for?
In our library "Take This Longing" is recommended for: deep listening, emotional release, meditation, relaxation. These tags are assigned only where the song's sensory profile genuinely supports the use case.
When was "Take This Longing" released?
"Take This Longing" is from 1971, on the album "Songs of Love and Hate". It appears in our 1970s catalog.
What is the emotional mood of "Take This Longing"?
We tag "Take This Longing" as contemplative, emotional, introspective, melancholy, romantic. Moods are tonal descriptors based on how the song reads emotionally — separate from the sensory intensity axes.
What is the vocal style of "Take This Longing"?
The vocal style is soft vocals.
Is "Take This Longing" good for running?
Not really — at 60 BPM it's below most running cadences. Better for warm-up, cool-down, or walking. Recreational runners typically step at 140-175 BPM.
Is "Take This Longing" good for studying?
Only partially. The song's dynamic range (5/10) means there will be loud moments that break focus during deep work.
Can I use "Take This Longing" for sleep?
Not recommended for sleep. Dynamic range is too high — quiet moments will be ambushed by louder ones.
Should I listen to "Take This Longing"?
"Take This Longing" is Moderate intensity — fine for most listeners, but with enough dynamic activity that it works best as active listening rather than background.
Songs with the same DNA
smooth texture, similar intensity — across any genre or era.
Safer alternatives with a similar feel
These songs share similar moods but with a gentler sensory profile.
What this song means to people
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Where to next?
You know how this one feels — now go find the next one.