The Way It Is (Bruce Hornsby song)

"The Way It Is"
UK & European picture sleeves
Single by Bruce Hornsby and the Range
from the album The Way It Is
B-side"The Wild Frontier"
ReleasedJuly 1986 (UK)[1]
September 1986 (worldwide)
StudioStudio D (Sausalito, California)
Genre
Length4:58
LabelRCA
Songwriter(s)Bruce Hornsby
Producer(s)Bruce Hornsby, Elliot Scheiner
Bruce Hornsby and the Range singles chronology
"Every Little Kiss"
(1986) 		"The Way It Is"
(1986) 		"On the Western Skyline"
(1986)

"The Way It Is" is a song by American rock group Bruce Hornsby and the Range. It was released in July 1986 as the second single from their debut album, The Way It Is. The song topped the charts in the US, Canada and the Netherlands in 1986,[4] and peaked inside the top twenty in such countries as Australia, Ireland, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Written by Bruce Hornsby, it made explicit reference to the Economic Opportunity Act, also known as the 1964 Poverty Act, as well as the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

  1. ^ "UK charts".
  2. ^ Breihan, Tom (January 22, 2021). "The Number Ones: Bruce Hornsby & The Range's "The Way It Is". Stereogum. Retrieved September 30, 2023. Bruce Hornsby & The Range's "The Way It Is," the gentle and florid soft-rock jam, is unambiguously a song about racism...
  3. ^ Smith, Troy L. (May 13, 2021). "Every No. 1 song of the 1980s ranked from worst to best". Cleveland.com. Retrieved January 30, 2023.
  4. ^ Metzger, John (November 2000). "Against the Grain: An Interview with Bruce Hornsby". The Music Box. 7 (11). Retrieved May 4, 2007.