This number reached #36 on the US chart, making it the band's fifth-best-selling single during their career. The group brought in producer Andy Johns for the album Long Cold Winter. On this song, you can hear the influence from his previous production work with bands Bad Company and Free.
In a Songfacts interview with Cinderella lead singer Tom Keifer, he mentions his fondness for The blues. There are various genres of blues, and what Keifer does with "The Last Mile" is lay out self-confessional lyrics in a Delta style while the band plays out a British blues sound as a foundation. The song plays out in parallel universes: Tom displays a brief measure of arpeggio picking in the intro, which seems to be a style he was processing at the time, as he does it with another cut from Long Cold Winter, "Coming Home."
The lyrics are a great example of Tom Keifer's struggles of being on the road and the weariness it entails. The time to think as the miles roll past sitting on the tour bus staring out the window into the faceless landscape. "Monkeys on my back I gotta find a better way." The indulgences that tempt to escape the pressures of staying on top. He struggles with what is reality and the challenge of the advise he receives from the folks of the Mississippi farmland, "they told me to take it day by day." The mantra of the blues.
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