Results for “trust and risk”

Songs

If We Can't Trust Each Other

Ann Peebles

A stark relationship ultimatum built almost entirely on a single conditional refrain, this song treats mutual suspicion as a…

trust and suspicion jealousy relationship ultimatums

Trust

Prince

Written for the Batman soundtrack, this track uses seduction as camouflage for a darker interrogation of manipulation and…

seduction as manipulation power and control faith versus flattery

Can I Believe You

Fleet Foxes

A song about the terror of trusting someone enough to be believed, written as a spiral of unanswered questions rather than…

trust and vulnerability emotional guardedness self-doubt

Sleeps With Butterflies

Tori Amos

A woman addresses a departing or emotionally elusive lover, refusing to grasp at him while insisting on her own worth. The song…

romantic autonomy fear of abandonment masked by composure flight and distance as metaphor for emotional withdrawal

When I Fall

Lizz Wright

A quiet meditation on the fear that precedes surrender in love, built around a single suspended image of standing at the edge of…

fear of vulnerability romantic longing hesitation vs. surrender

Nothing Else Matters

Phoebe Bridgers

This is a cover, not an original composition, so the critical interest lies in interpretation rather than authorship: Phoebe…

devotion autonomy from outside judgment intimacy

Throw It All Away

Brandi Carlile

A quiet devotional song built on the idea that romantic security matters more than any external certainty. The narrator imagines…

unconditional devotion emotional security vulnerability and anxiety

Show Me Love

Robyn

A teenage Robyn's breakout single is a straightforward Eurodance declaration of romantic surrender, built around a repeated plea…

romantic vulnerability independence versus surrender demand for reciprocity

Small Plane

Bill Callahan

A quiet domestic love song disguised as an account of piloting a small plane together. The flight becomes a working metaphor for…

domestic trust shared control in partnership contentment

Ol' Red

George Jones

A comic prison narrative told in George Jones's late-career storyteller voice, in which a convicted murderer talks his way into…

cunning versus authority folk-hero outlawry trust and betrayal

Every Word

Sade

A quietly devastating account of betrayal, built around the image of returning a letter and everything it contained. Sade's…

betrayal broken trust disillusionment

Dance On a Volcano

Genesis

A driving opener built around the image of a lethal dance performed on the lip of an active volcano, where every misstep is…

risk and consequence performance under pressure mortality

Hold My Life

The Replacements

A twentysomething asks someone else to hang onto his life for safekeeping because he doesn't trust himself with it yet. The song…

fear of self-destruction delayed adulthood dependency and trust

Rev On the Red Line

Foreigner

A straightforward car-racing anthem that uses drag-strip mechanics as a vehicle for macho self-definition. The song's pleasures…

speed and risk masculine bravado rebellion against authority

How Can I Be Sure of You (Previously unreleased)

Harry Nilsson

A small argument about the color of the sun spirals into a meditation on epistemic vertigo -- how do you trust anything,…

epistemological doubt trust and betrayal perception vs. reality

The Line

D'Angelo

An artist opens Voodoo's closing statement by directly addressing rumor and scrutiny, framing his return to music as a…

artistic risk public scrutiny pride and self-determination

Leaning On the Everlasting Arm

Iris DeMent

This is Iris DeMent's rendition of a well-known 19th-century hymn, part of her Lifeline album of traditional gospel songs…

religious faith surrender and trust comfort in dependency

Mighty Wings

Cheap Trick

A pulsing arena-rock anthem built for a movie about jet pilots, this song trades Cheap Trick's usual wit and irony for…

risk and ambition transcendence through flight smallness of earthly life

Cold Sweat

Thin Lizzy

A gambler's monologue delivered as tense, driving hard rock, built around the physical sensation of nervous sweat rather than…

risk and compulsion masculine bravado poverty and escape fantasy

Who Is It (Carry My Joy On the Left, Carry My Pain On the Right)

Björk

A largely a cappella meditation built on beatboxing and vocal layering, this track from Medulla circles a single riddle-like…

trust and devotion emotional equilibrium self-interrogation

If I'm On the Late Side

Faces

A plain, tender travel song built around a small domestic anxiety: two people trying to meet up, and one partner reassuring the…

trust in separation travel as metaphor for commitment reassurance

It Hurts Like Hell (from Waiting to Exhale - Original Soundtrack)

Aretha Franklin

Aretha Franklin sings a ballad about love curdling into pain without dying outright, where the couple still cares but has lost…

love and suffering intertwined emotional exhaustion fear of vulnerability

Light My Fire

The Doors

A direct sexual invitation dressed as a song about urgency and risk, built around a fire metaphor that doubles as both seduction…

desire and urgency risk/consequence of love carpe diem

I Dare You

The xx

A duet-style track built around the exhilaration and risk of falling into infatuation, with the two vocalists trading lines that…

infatuation vulnerability risk-taking in love

Kern River

Merle Haggard

A grief-haunted ballad in which a river becomes both the site of love and the site of loss, and the refusal to ever swim it…

grief and loss fear of intimacy after tragedy California working-class geography

Fearless

Pink Floyd

A meditation on stubborn self-reliance framed as a hill climb, where the singer answers doubters not with argument but with…

self-determination defiance of doubters folly and wisdom reversed

Ever Again

Robyn

A dance-pop declaration of self-protective optimism, in which the narrator tries to talk both a partner and herself into…

emotional self-protection cyclical relationships vulnerability disguised as resolve

Archangel

Burial

Built almost entirely from pitch-shifted vocal samples looping a handful of phrases, this track uses repetition and vocal…

isolation longing for belonging fragile intimacy

Come from the Heart

Guy Clark

A folk-country parable that turns inherited wisdom into a simple checklist for living without fear. Guy Clark and co-writer…

letting go authenticity vs. self-consciousness inherited wisdom

I Want Your Sex, Pts. 1 & 2

George Michael

George Michael turns a single, blunt demand into a sustained argument about desire, patience, and monogamy, dressing up a simple…

sexual desire and frustration persuasion and rhetoric monogamy versus promiscuity

Indestructible

Robyn

A dancefloor anthem that treats romantic vulnerability as a physics problem, framing love in terms of gravity, light, and orbit.…

romantic risk self-persuasion through repetition transcendence via dance

Andromeda

Weyes Blood

Weyes Blood turns cosmic distance into a metaphor for romantic avoidance, using the vastness of a galaxy to describe an…

emotional avoidance romantic risk self-protection vs. vulnerability

You Can Close Your Eyes

Carly Simon

This is a hushed lullaby built around a single reassurance: things will keep turning, and it's safe to rest. Carly Simon's…

comfort and reassurance transience and continuity love as a form of legacy

Thrown Down

Fleetwood Mac

A Stevie Nicks composition for Fleetwood Mac's 2003 reunion album, this song circles a fraught reconciliation between two people…

romantic obsession broken trust self-abasement in love

Starting Over

Chris Stapleton

A road-trip song about leaving a stale life behind for the sake of a relationship, built on plainspoken folk-country imagery of…

renewal and reinvention risk and commitment partnership over place

Hit the Ground

Lizz Wright

A spare, mantra-like invitation to shed fear and step into presence, addressed to a hesitant lover or friend. Lizz Wright builds…

encouragement vulnerability and trust renewal

Drive

R.E.M.

Drive opens Automatic for the People as a stark, semi-acoustic address to an unnamed younger generation, built almost entirely…

generational drift autonomy and its risks rock and roll as inheritance and myth

Buck

Nina Simone

A direct, sensual address to a lover named Buck, built almost entirely on the tension between physical size and gentleness. It's…

physical intimacy trust and fidelity masculinity vs. tenderness

Suzanne

Leonard Cohen

A meditation on grace and surrender disguised as a portrait of a woman by a river, Cohen's song moves from intimate seduction…

spiritual longing disguised as romance the sacred in the everyday trust and surrender

Somebody Already Broke My Heart

Sade

A wary plea from someone entering a new relationship while still bruised from the last one. The song works less as a love song…

emotional guardedness vulnerability in new love fear of repetition