Brad Paisley/Tear Jerker
Considering his reputation for upbeat, tongue-in-cheek lyrics -- This country singer does quite a lot of these songs that can make you cry.
- "When I Get Where I'm Going", particularly the chorus with Dolly Parton.
"When I get where I'm going
there'll be only happy tears.
I will shed the sins and struggles
I have carried all these years.
And I'll leave my heart wide open
I will love and have no fear.
Yeah when I get where I'm going
Don't cry for me down here."
- "Whiskey Lullaby" (with Alison Krauss) is a song about a man who finds his wife cheating on him. He's broken by it, and becomes a drunk, eventually committing suicide. When she sees what she did to him, she follows the path. If the lyrics themselves don't have you in tears, the video will, as it shows the man was coming home from a war and she was the only thing that had been keeping him going.
"He put that bottle to his head and pulled the trigger
And finally drank away her memory.
Life is short, but this time it was bigger
Than the strength he had to stand up off his knees."
- Also affecting could be these lines:
"We found her with her face down in the pillow
Clinging to his picture for dear life
We laid her next to him beneath the willow
While the angels sang a whiskey lullaby."
- "Waitin' On A Woman". A young guy waits on his girlfriend/wife(?) in a mall, and sits down next to an old man who tells him about all the times he's had to wait on his wife over the years. It was worth it.
- It is made even more of a Tear Jerker with the video. They have Andy Griffith speak the lyrics in and out through the entire song. This is especially sweet and tear worthy when Andy is sitting on a bench in Heaven saying, "Honey, take your time, 'cause I don't mind... waiting on a woman." It might be far better than having Brad Paisley sing it.
- "You'll Never Leave Harlan Alive" (written by Darrell Scott) is basically a dirge about those who have lived and died in eastern Kentucky. In other words, it a ballad about getting out of a hellhole -- and falling back in again.
"Where the sun comes up about ten in the morning
And the sun comes down about three in the day
And you fill your cup with whatever bitter brew you're drinking
And you spend your life digging coal from the bottom of your grave."
- "A Man Don't Have to Die [dead link] " will cause Manly Tears to well up in its account of unemployment, divorce and alcoholism.
- "Letter to Me" can make one weep like a child.
- "He Didn't Have to Be".