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I'm asking this out of a little curiosity and insomnia - I was looking online for lists of people's favorite love songs and dedications, kind of like those late night radio dedication shows you listen to on road trips when it's the only radio station you can get.
I discovered that a lot of people like a lot of cheesy songs that I am not so into, but when I read their dedications it becomes kind of sweet.
So I thought I'd pose the questions - what are some of your favorite love songs? And why? Do you have any stories attached to them?
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You're Everything On Earth by The Outsiders. - Because it's short and to the point. No personal story attached.
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Everyday Love by Rascal Flatts. Because it is so happy and incredibly relatable. It doesn't put on a pedestal the romance that is fleeting, but values the love that takes place everyday.
quote:Originally posted by Armoth: Because it is so happy and incredibly relatable.
That pretty well sums of why I love Rascal Flatts. (Well, ok, some of my favorites are theirs aren't happy.)
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She's Got a Way by Billy Joel. Because it's just Billy Joel and the piano. Joel has a way with songs like that.
No One's Gonna Love You by Band of Horses. Just like listening to it. Don't know if it's really a love song based on all the lyrics, but the chorus is sweet and catchy.
Can't Fight This Feeling by REO Speedwagon. Because as a young man in the 80s, I thought this was the most romantic song there was.
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Strangers in the Night made famous by Frank Sinatra, because a song about bangin' a stranger is still easy listening so long as you include a line about staying together forever.
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Always, by Erasure. I am uncertain whether I would love this half as much if it hadn't been licensed by Robot Unicorn Attack, but the experience of Robot Unicorn Attack ranks among the most magical sources of pure joy I have experienced in my adult life, and quite possibly the single most important quality of my future wife will be the ability for the two of us to sit together singing that song.
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My best friend thinks the most romantic song in the world is Taj Mahal by Sam Roberts. I think it's pretty romantic, and very nice as well. I think part of that is that it's her favorite band.
Personally I think Lover Lay Down by Dave Matthews Band is a really romantic song, but that's also MY favorite band. I'd also add to that Love of my Life by Dave and Carlos Santana. That's actually probably above the first one.
I don't know. Sometimes I feel a push/pull between romantic songs with especially romantic lyrics, and romantic songs that smoother, more sensual sounding, that put me at ease. Both of the Dave Matthews songs fit into the sensual love song genre. On the other hand, country music seems to have some of the best songs that really express that lovin feelin.
Stuff like I Cross My Heart by George Straight are nice romantic love songs, but it's not something I'm going to listen to all the time (my country days are a little behind me, oh the 90s). I guess my difference is between love songs and romantic songs, which as I think of it, aren't the same thing.
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Home by Duncan Sheik (live)Album version. because it's hauntingly beautiful, and also because it's a song about longing for a your new love because you are apart, but never separate.
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Interesting. So what makes a good love song? Lyrics? Music? Or does it have to be both?
One of the sexiest songs ever is "Have a Little Faith in Me" by John Hiatt. I think it's mostly the music, though. The lyrics are nice, but it's the music that gets you.
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quote:Originally posted by Annie: Interesting. So what makes a good love song? Lyrics? Music? Or does it have to be both?
One of the sexiest songs ever is "Have a Little Faith in Me" by John Hiatt. I think it's mostly the music, though. The lyrics are nice, but it's the music that gets you.
Maybe it's just a guy thing, but I don't listen to a lot of sappy love songs for the sake of their being love songs. I listen to some country, and a lot of old rat pack music and jazz, which inherently includes a lot of love song type music in it. But most of it doesn't really grab me.
I do like 90s slow jamz, which are like 99% love songs, and like I mentioned earlier, I like smoother, more sensual sounding romantic numbers. It just seems like those are the kind of songs you can enjoy listening to with someone, whereas the others are, I don't know, just there.
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"Get Out the Map," by the Indigo Girls. I love the sense of wanderlust, the sharing of adventures together with someone you love. But most of all I like the vulnerability, the sense that love isn't just in some mythical frozen moment in time when everything is perfect with your life. Sweet moments will pass and you'll have to get back to the nitty gritty. Your friends will move away and pass out of your life. We'll gain weight and lose our youthful looks. So let's make the most of the moments we have with our loved ones.
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quote:Originally posted by Annie: One of the sexiest songs ever is "Have a Little Faith in Me" by John Hiatt. I think it's mostly the music, though. The lyrics are nice, but it's the music that gets you.
That, and the fact that it was on the soundtrack for one of my favorite movies EVAR.
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I love that someone nominated "Closer". *laugh*
Some of my picks (click to a separate tab rather than bothering with watching the videos, since they're mostly lame. They're just to give an idea of the music, is all.) :
I Love You and Answer by Sarah McLachlan. Not flashy, but calm and committed, like a good relationship. They remind me of my first girlfriend back in high school, who I'd dated for like a week, then she moved away, then we got back together a few years later. Got the whole "first love" nostalgia thing going.
Heather Nova has a ton of good stuff. Winterblue ... Valley of Sound ... Talk To Me ... same as above. Driving at night in the rain holding hands in winter. (Well, as wintery as Hawaii gets.)
Pretty much anything by Hem.
Sting's got a bunch. Fields of Gold makes me cry practically every time I hear it. Sacred Love is pretty sexy. Depending on what one is into, I mean.
Truly Madly Deeply EGAD this is so corny, but I like it so much I don't even count it as a "guilty" pleasure. This one goes back, heck, to middle school crushes. *laugh*
Who's To Say? and Hands On Me by Vanessa Carlton kept me alive when I was working nights at a dead-end job after I'd broken up with someone.
Jack Johnson's got a bunch. No Other Way, "Know that if I knew all the answers, I would not hold them from you."
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Liebestod, because it's the most beautiful piece written (of any music I've heard) and even if it's a very Schopenhauer expression of love, it's still a very strong expression of that love.
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Just because my wife walked down the aisle to this at our wedding (and because it is incredibly romantic, with or without context), I have to nominate "Once Upon a Time... Storybook Love" from The Princess Bride (for the record, she appeared on the aisle at about the :56 mark on that version, which I don't think is straight from the movie but not too far from it).
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Home by Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros always, always, always makes both me and my partner cry. In the good way. And seeing this version definitely didn't help us on the "not bawling like a baby" front.
Guh. The youtube video is playing in another tab and I'm starting to cry right now. Such a sap for this song. Bleh.
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Dennis Deyoung's version of Once Upon A Dream, from the musical Jeckyll and Hyde. It is soul-crushing for me. I can't listen to it. It makes me think of a particular girl who has passed on, and the line, "Now, you're just a dream" makes me die a little when I hear it.
It is an amazing arrangement for two acoustic guitars. I can't find a (legal) link to his version of the full song, but there is a clip of it here.
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I think female singers and male singers sing pretty different love songs. And not just in that Sixpence None the Richer sense of gendered pronouns or whatever.
I have not wound up having favorite love songs because my husband and I have such different tastes in music. My own favorite love song is probably Indigo Girl's Love will come to you.
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quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: Home by Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros always, always, always makes both me and my partner cry. In the good way. And seeing this version definitely didn't help us on the "not bawling like a baby" front.
Guh. The youtube video is playing in another tab and I'm starting to cry right now. Such a sap for this song. Bleh.
quote:Originally posted by advice for robots: She's Got a Way by Billy Joel. Because it's just Billy Joel and the piano. Joel has a way with songs like that.
Billy Joel could turn a beer commercial into a love song.
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quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: Home by Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros always, always, always makes both me and my partner cry. In the good way. And seeing this version definitely didn't help us on the "not bawling like a baby" front.
Guh. The youtube video is playing in another tab and I'm starting to cry right now. Such a sap for this song. Bleh.
Oh, heavens. Seconded.
Thirded, that's a great song. I've seen the youtube video before, it's cute. I listen to "Home" all the time. ES&TMZ have such a unique sound, I could listen to them for hours.
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quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: Home by Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros always, always, always makes both me and my partner cry. In the good way. And seeing this version definitely didn't help us on the "not bawling like a baby" front.
Guh. The youtube video is playing in another tab and I'm starting to cry right now. Such a sap for this song. Bleh.
Oh, heavens. Seconded.
Thirded, that's a great song. I've seen the youtube video before, it's cute. I listen to "Home" all the time. ES&TMZ have such a unique sound, I could listen to them for hours.
I made the mistake of showing my partner this thread. We're both trying not to cry now. We are so lame.
Glad we're not the only ones that like it, though (duh, the youtube vid has over 10 million views, but yeah, neat that people in this thread agree).
We've both, at various times over the years, moved to places where one or both of us knew literally nobody there, and we were basically each other's lifelines. That's about the closest thing to a "story" we've got for that song, but frankly, it doesn't need a story. It stands pretty well on its own.
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I think it's mostly the lyrics, and no one has mentioned it. I like the individual images and the story as a whole.
I think sincerity in the voice is important in love songs, at least for me. But i'm not exactly sure how to quantify that...
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Samson is definitely all about the delivery, a song with lyrics about wonder bread is not innately romantic. But when Regina performs it live it is very inspiring indeed.
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"I'm Your Moon" by Jonathan Coulton is a sweet little song about a dwarf planet and the moon who loves it.
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I made a mixed tape (that's like a playlist, for you youngsters) when I was in 10th grade called "Streetlights" that was all love songs. Originally it was meant for a girl I liked at the time, but I didn't ever end up giving it to her. I found the tape a couple years back and spent a good couple of weeks enjoying it. Here are the songs I remember from the track list:
That's about half of it, I would guess. A few other random favorites (mostly from the time I was growing up and falling in and out of love regularly) include:
In general, the songs I find most romantic aren't "sexy," they're more "sappy." The instrumental tone of the song generally matters more than the lyrics to me, although lyrics aren't wholly unimportant and can sometimes make the difference between a song I like alright and a song that becomes a favorite.
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I'll definitely second a couple songs on that list:
"More than Words" was one of my favorite songs as a kid.
"Crazy Love" I think fits into what I was saying earlier about my preferred type of love song.
"Love Song" is a great song, but I totally like the 311 version better. I know, people often disdain remakes, but it feels a lot more romantic.
"Love, Me" is right up there with the best country love songs that I was talking about earlier. Stuff like that, "Don't Take the Girl," "It's your Love," "I Cross my heart," are some of what I like best about country. So great at weaving stories and lyrics to express emotions.
These Are the Times by Dru Hill is a song I like because, especially for the genre and the era, it preached a much deeper message of love than a lot of others. I like that the message of the song is that the guy likes the girl so much that he'd be just as happy sitting and talking with her all night instead of anything more.
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Oooh - ooh. If you like "Love Song," and you like 311 doing "Love Song," you'll love Adele doing "Love Song."Posts: 8504 | Registered: Aug 1999
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The whole thing is about half an hour, but here's the final two minutes of the love duet between Siegfried and Brunhilde. I guess I just find love songs more moving when there's a 70 piece orchestra backing them.
quote:Originally posted by Annie: Oooh - ooh. If you like "Love Song," and you like 311 doing "Love Song," you'll love Adele doing "Love Song."
Didn't really care for it. I don't mind simplicity and slowing things down like that, but, I don't know it felt kind of blah.
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My favorite love song by far has to be Drunkard's Prayer by Over the Rhine. The simplicity and directness of the lyrics impact me in a way that more complicated or shallow songs never have. (there's an album version on the suggestions tab to the right, but it seems to have video of someone's wedding, so I was uncomfortable linking to it)
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I'm surprised I haven't seen Iris by the Goo Goo Dolls yet. It's pretty sappy, but I remember loving it when I was 12. I still love the opening line "I'd give up forever to touch you." (Looking back, I realize 2/3rds of the songs I've posted so far have been full of deep, heartrending longing. I wonder what that says about me)
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How could no one have mentioned If I were a Carpenter as performed by Johnny Cash and June Carter? The way she says "I'd have your baby" sounds like a happy promise instead or a lyric in a song she didn't write.
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"Be Careful, It's My Heart" always kind of depressing to me because he's singing it while Fred Astaire is stealing his woman. Of course, that leads to "Washington's Birthday," which is my favorite song in the movie, but it's not romantic, it's just hilarious.
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Some of my favorite bands don't have happy love songs. Love songs about lovers who cheat or ignore them, yeah, but very few sappy true love songs.
And this was "our song" when my ex and I were together. Its kind of bizarre because its not the kind of music that either of us liked but we'd danced to it at his friend's wedding reception. Better Together by Jack JohnsonPosts: 1733 | Registered: Apr 2005
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I'd also add to that Love of my Life by Dave and Carlos Santana. That's actually probably above the first one. 
