by Geoff Fox
With Saturday being Valentine’s Day, there must be some tunes playing as you keep things romantic with your special someone. No genre of music has more of those songs than country music.
We’re not talking the stuff on country radio right now. No, we’re talking about country that has the love pouring out of it from the first note to the fade out.
So sit back for a few suggestions to get the romantic juices flowing.
In all of country music, there is but one king – George Strait.
There could be a whole list of songs from his catalog that could be put here, but let’s look at two songs that came out within a year of each other.
The first song came out in 1992 when Warner Bros. released the movie Pure Country, which Strait starred in as Wyatt “Dusty” Chandler.
In the song, Chandler/Strait tells the woman his love is unconditional and that they’ve known it from the start of the relationship, how she makes his life complete and as they look to the future make it the best that it can be.
The chorus reads as anyone should give their love, “I cross my heart and promise to/Give all I’ve got to make all your dreams come true/In all the world, you’ll never find/A love as true as mine.”
A year later, Strait would release the album “Easy Come, Easy Go” with the song “The Man in Love With You” as track eight.
Strait is telling the girl that he may not be a hero, or be able to give her all she ever wanted, or even the dream she wanted to come true, but no matter what, he’s in love with her.
He tells her that when the world won’t turn how she wants or those dreams she has won’t come true, he’ll be there for her and to help her through everything.
If you want more Strait love songs, Pandora or Spotify can fill your need.
One of the most unique voices in country music was Joe Diffie.
In 1994, Diffie released “So Help Me Girl” on his album “Third Rock From the Sun.”
The song is a guy telling the girl the way she kissed and held him the night before and being there the next morning sent him over the edge in love, because it’s “way too late” to save his heart and he knows he’s never been so loved.
It’s a song where, as a guy, you want the woman to know you love her and she made you fall in love with her.
Another song from 1994 that makes this list is Tracy Byrd’s “The Keeper of the Stars.”
Byrd’s song is about a guy telling his girl how thankful he is for having her in his life.
He tells her it was predetermined long before they ever knew each other that they would be together.
And for that predetermination, he tips his cowboy hat to the keeper of the stars because “he sure knew what he was doing when he joined these two hearts.”
He also tells the girl how beautiful she looks with the moonlight on her face, how he doesn’t deserve her, and how there’s no words to say how grateful he is.
For the next song, you have one of the most underrated voices of the late 90s, early 2000s country music – Chris Ledoux.
Ledoux was a rodeo bull rider turned country music singer who would sell tapes out of the back of his car at the rodeos until some guy named Garth Brooks name checked him in a song and got him mainstream notoriety.
For this list, “Look at You Girl” is a song every guy who loves his woman should play, whether he’s a country fan or not.
The guy in the song is looking at his girl and getting lost in love just looking at her.
He tells the girl she looks like a dream he dreamed somewhere, how he sees his own reflection in her eyes and how they tell a story with her smile.
In the chorus, Ledoux tells the girl “I’m an ordinary man/But I feel like I could do anything in the world/When I look at you girl.”
With Ledoux’s cowboy voice carries that love across the air and makes it hit that much harder.
So, guys, if you love your girl, play this song for her.
Another entry comes from another movie.
In 1980, Anne Murray recorded “Could I Have This Dance?” for the film “Urban Cowboy” and as a single in August of that year.
The female singer remembers the first date she and her partner had when they fell in love and wants to stay in that moment for the rest of her life.
That feeling is one of knowing you’re in love with someone and wanting their presence, their energy, their love, their everything in your life for the rest of yours.
The chorus could almost be used for a proposal.
“Could I have this for the rest of my life?/Could you be my partner every night?/When we’re together, if feels so right/Could I have this dance for the rest of my life?”
Moving to a song about married couples, Clint Black’s 1997 hit “Something That We Do” is a guy looking back at the day he and his wife got married and what love is.
Love isn’t something found, it’s something done.
In the chorus, Black tells his wife how they make each other “all that we can be” and find their individual strength and inspiration independently, but at the same time working together is what sets them apart to the point “we can’t tell where I end and where you start.”
The third verse has Black telling his wife how they started with a simple vow and, with so much to look back on (Black had been married to his wife Lisa Hartman Black for six years when the song was released), everything still feels brand new.
In 1979, George Jones was given a song that he almost passed on because he thought “Nobody’ll buy that morbid son of a bitch.”
However, he did record the song and released it in April 1980 and “He Stopped Loving Her Today” would go on to hit #1 on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart.
The man in the song never gave up on loving his girlfriend or wife, and over the years read the love letter from 1962 and even kept her picture on the wall, all in hopes she’d come back. He even told her he’d love her until he died.
But there came the day where he got all dressed up to go away and finally had a smile on his face.
The reason? He had passed away and he finally stopped loving her.
The ex came back to see him one last time with Jones stating, “This time he’s finally over for good.”
Jones’ voice gives the song a haunting feel and it’s a song only he could pull off, even though Johnny Cash recorded a version in 2003.
The next song was released in 1974 by the song’s writer, Dolly Parton and hit #1 on the Billboard Country Charts that year. It would hit #1 again in 1992, but this time another artist would take the honor when Whitney Houston recorded it for “The Bodyguard” soundtrack.
That song is “I Will Always Love You.”
The song is about a breakup of a relationship between a couple that doesn’t end up getting ugly, but instead the couple parting with respect.
However, there’s a bit of a deeper meaning.
Parton wrote the song as a farewell to business partner and mentor Porter Wagoner as she went off on to have a solo career.
While it’s a breakup song, it’s a song saying the singer would still love their partner after they move on.
No matter if it’s Parton’s original or Houston’s cover, the song is still a romantic song.
The last song is another song that has a country and pop/R&B version – “I Swear.”
John Michael Montgomery released the song in 1993 with All-4-One covering it in 1994. Montgomery would release another song, “I Can Love You Like That” in February 1995 with All-4-One releasing it a few months later.
In “I Swear,” Montgomery is telling the girl for better or worse, till death do they part, he swears he’ll love her with every beat of his heart.
He makes promises to give her everything he can, she’ll only cry happy tears, and when they’re both have gray hair, he’ll still love her.
There’s hundreds of country songs that aren’t included, but that’s the beauty of the genre, there’s too many to even think about. There are new love songs that haven’t even been recorded yet, just waiting for the right artist to sing it.
