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Country Music Workout

Country music artists have a lock on hilarious lyrics sung with straight faces. Collectively, they also hold the record for the greatest number of songs about unrequited love that involve a church and a wedding.

I was reminded of these accomplishments this morning as I jogged on a treadmill at the South Shore Health and Racquet Club. My iPod was turned way up to drown out the woman on the treadmill next to mine who was chatting loudly on her cell phone.

So I listened to Billy Ray Cyrus cry, “I’m so miserable without you it’s almost like you were here.” I also heard him ask, “Where am I gonna live when I get home?” Cyrus’s songs more often than not are about how he didn’t treat his lady well and she’s taken sweet revenge. You’d think he’d learn.

As for songs revolving around a church and a wedding, three of them came up on my hit list this morning. The aforementioned Cyrus sang, “It could have been me standing next to you,” as he reviews how he never told his girlfriend how he really felt. Now that she’s married someone else, he’s remorseful. Again, there’s a learning curve here, Billy.

Garth Brooks and Lyle Lovett take the wedding song to darker regions. Brooks sings that he won’t have to wonder anymore, and I assume it’s because the love of his life has married someone else as he sat in his pick-up truck across the street from the church. But the song ends with the suggestion that Brooks won’t have to wonder any more because he’s jumped off a bridge. It’s pretty dark.

Lovett’s ode is darker. He enters the church with a .45 pistol as his loved one is marrying someone else. Someone gets killed here, but I’m unsure whether it’s the happy couple or Lovett himself. Called L.A. County, it’s the bleakest of wedding songs.

I’ve always felt country artists should be given credit for their ingenuity, even if you don’t like the genre. They sing about washing machines and renegade dogs and dime stores. They make your toes tap, which is why I frequently listen to country music when I’m working out. The four/four beat of most songs helps establish a rhythm, whether it’s on a treadmill or doing sets with weights. I can’t imagine any woman wanting to work out and chat on a cell phone instead.

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