Tim McGraw "Live Like You Were Dying"

[Genesis315]

I heard this song on the radio today and thought it was one of the best I’ve heard in a while. I really liked how the guy uses the end of his life to forgive more, love more, read the Bible, be a better husband, and have some wholesome fun. I’ve always liked Tim McGraw (he has good songs, has a baseball pedigree, and seems to be agood family man) but this song made me a fan. What do you guys think?

 

[Lisa_N]

Genesis315:

I heard this song on the radio today and thought it was one of the best I’ve heard in a while. I really liked how the guy uses the end of his life to forgive more, love more, read the Bible, be a better husband, and have some wholesome fun. I’ve always liked Tim McGraw (he has good songs, has a baseball pedigree, and seems to be agood family man) but this song made me a fan. What do you gusy think?

I’d love to hear it. Should I track it down on a local CR station? I used to follow Tim’s dad Tug McGraw. I suspect he’s the subject of the song
Lisa N

 

[Genesis315]

Lisa N:

I’d love to hear it. Should I track it down on a local CR station? I used to follow Tim’s dad Tug McGraw. I suspect he’s the subject of the song
Lisa N

Ahhh, it never crossed my mind that it was about his dad. Makes sense. Anyway, I heard it on a kind of mix station.

 

[TheTruth0723]

The only country song I like (let alone tolerate )

 

[carol_marie]

I liked Tim McGraw until he put out the very pro-abortion song “Red Rag Top.” Country stations got alot of complaints and some refused to play it but it was still a huge hit… here’s some of the lyrics:

I was twenty and she was eighteen we were just as wild as were were green in the ways of the world.
She picked me up in that red rag top we were free from the folks and running from the cops, on a summer’s night… running all the red lights. We parked way out in a clearing in a grove, the night was as hot as a coal burnin’ stove… we were cooking the gas, we just had to last…

In the back of that red rag top
She said please don’t stop.

V2: The first time her mother met me, her green eyed girl had been a mother to be for two weeks. I was out of a job and she was in school, life was fast and the world was cruel…
we were young & wild, we decided not to have a child.
So we did what we did and we tried to forget and we swore up and
down there would be no regrets in the morning light
but on the way home that night…

In the back of that red rag top
she said please don’t stop… loving me.

So the song ends with him, much older wondering what happened to the girl but no mention of the baby who’s life they took.

 

[Meghan]

carol marie:

So the song ends with him, much older wondering what happened to the girl but no mention of the baby who’s life they took.

Actually, I found the song tragic and shows that abortion can cause life-long regrets. More than that, the couple in the song uses abortion to solve their “problem” and it ultimately is responsible for destroying them. When the narrator sees a green-eyed girl at the end of the song, he is reminded of the child that he killed and might be that girl, if she had lived.

Each time I hear it on the radio, I can’t hear it as pro-abortion.

 

[carol_marie]

Meghan:

Actually, I found the song tragic and shows that abortion can cause life-long regrets. More than that, the couple in the song uses abortion to solve their “problem” and it ultimately is responsible for destroying them. When the narrator sees a green-eyed girl at the end of the song, he is reminded of the child that he killed and might be that girl, if she had lived.

Each time I hear it on the radio, I can’t hear it as pro-abortion.

How do you figure that he’s thinking it could have been his child? He’s reminded of his girlfriend. He says:

I was stopped at a red light just yesterday, beside a young girl in a cabriolet and her eyes were green, I was back in an old scene.
I was back in that red rag top, on the day she stopped
loving me.

Just before that he says, “You do what you do & you pay for your sins, there’s no such thing as what might have been, that’s a waste of time, drive you outta your mind.”

So I don’t hear him regretting the abortion at all…he says he doesn’t even bother to think about it. And I don’t think it was the abortion that destroyed their relationship because he said “we took one more trip around the sun” after the abortion…

I hear the song as nothing but casual sex, get an abortion, have more sex, break up, & wonder whatever happened to that chic - all wrapped up in a catchy little tune.

 

[Meghan]

carol marie:

I hear the song as nothing but casual sex, get an abortion, have more sex, break up, & wonder whatever happened to that chic - all wrapped up in a catchy little tune.

I think you’re taking the song too literally and missing the intent behind the lyrics. Let’s just agree to disagree on this one.

 

[Edwin1961]

Lisa N:

I’d love to hear it. Should I track it down on a local CR station? I used to follow Tim’s dad Tug McGraw. I suspect he’s the subject of the song
Lisa N

The song is on Tim’s current CD, which is of the same name as the song. (Title Cut).I have the CD and like it.

 

[godsent]

i also love that song,tim mcgraw is a brilliant singer and a great artist!
Hope he makes some more songs of that nature!

 

[SHJ-BVM]

Carol Marie,

I agree with you about RRT being a pro-abortion song.

I was a huge TM fan (saw him in concert in '94), lost much of my respect for him after the concert, and then ALL respect when that song came out. I still have his earlier cd’s, but I cannot, in good conscience, purchase anything that in any way, shape or form, supports him. (There’s also an aside in the last paragraph).

BTW…LLYWD wasn’t written by TM…the writers of the song are Tim Nichols & Craig Wiseman. The video for the song uses alot of clips of TM’s dad, but I don’t really think the song was written specifically about him. The songs opening line is “I was in my early forties, with a lot of life before me…”- Tug McGraw was diagnosed with the brain tumor when he was 58. Although writers do take “poetic license”, I have the feeling the song wasn’t written about TM’s dad, but TM saw the similarity with his dad and the lyrics of the song.

The aside…I lost a lot of respect for TM after the first concert I went to because after spending hard earned $$$ on the tickets and joining the fan club (which I joined specifically for the ‘meet and greet’ after the concert), we (all fan club members) were summarily turned away after the concert–we were told he was no longer doing m&g’s. Mind you this was back when he was still relatively small time. I was really wary about ever joining another fan club, but when Darryl Worley was due to perform at the county fair last year, I figured I’d try just one more time. Because the price of the tickets were so inexpensive, we (DH and I) went to both performances and I met DW after each show. Now he’s a singer who knows how to treat his fans. For those who don’t follow country music DW wrote “Have You Forgotten”…concerning the events of 9-11. I too had written a poem (that was published), also concerning 9-11. A very dear friend who is a graphics designer made a print of the flag with my poem superimposed on it. I made a copy and gave it to DW at the first m&g. He actually read it during the time between the two concerts. During the second m&g he told me he liked what I had written, we discussed cadence/wording/etc. We also discussed my military service and he thanked me for having served. As I said, he knows how to treat the people who spend their money on him. I’ll see if DH can post a pic of me and DW.

 

[Twin_2_of_2]

I know this is an old topic, but my pastor has just found this song. He’s not a country music person but he found the lyrics inspiring. He even had a homily about this song. All in all, my pastor said that htis song will happen in our lives in one form or another. Live like we were dying.