Three Chords And The Truth About Lies In Country Music
Categoria: Musica
In this week's Country Update lead story, songwriters break down deceit in their lyrics.
Por Billboard | 29/07/2026
The truth hurts. Sometimes it’s the listener who feels it, sometimes it’s a third person who’s victimized by the pain, and sometimes the truth-teller suffers worse than anyone else for having to say it. But people lie. Regardless of their reasons or their intent, that creates drama. And that drama is ripe for country songs. Lying is an enormously popular topic in country. It was in the music even before Hank Williams blasted a dishonest lover in “Your Cheatin’ Heart” in the 1950s. Lies remain at the core of the genre now. “I think you always come to country music when your heart is broken, and lying is usually the biggest reason that a heart gets broken,” suggests The Band Perry ’s lead vocalist, Kimberly Perry. “We have those standard topics in our format. We write love songs to beer. We have a lot of gospel-adjacent themes in our music, and then cheating and lying and heartbreak would have to be the third tier of that trilogy.” Or, perhaps, the third tear. Lies are, once again, earning attention in the genre. The Band Perry’s “You Lie” has been reimagined as a new collaboration with Kaitlin Butts. Morgan Wallen ’s “Lies Lies Lies” and Jelly Roll ’s “Liar” both topped Billboard ’s Country Airplay in the last 20 months. And Zach Top ’s “I Never Lie” peaked at No. 2 while snagging two nominations each in the Country Music Association, Academy of Country Music and Grammy Awards shows. Corey Kent’s current “Empty Words,” at No. 39 on the Country Airplay list dated Aug. 1, provides a particularly detailed understanding of lies and their consequences. Its protagonist has shape-shifted his stories so much that now “even the truth sounds like a lie.” The guy is left to himself, forced to wallow in his self-created, negative consequences. The scenario in “Empty Words” doesn’t match Kent’s experiences exactly, but he’s been banished to the couch in his marriage, so the song is based in a reality he’s lived. “Contrary to popular belief, I think that truth still sells,” he says. “Making up a story about meeting a girl in a bar, when you clearly didn’t live like that, that still works, but I think this works on a deeper level. Like, everybody’s been there, even if it’s not this exact storyline, even if you didn’t mess up to the point where she left forever.” A night or two on the couch may be a transitory condition in an otherwise stable relationship, but when lying becomes a long-term problem, it also yields long-term results. “Trust is a toothpick,” “Empty Words” co-writer and co-producer Austin Goodloe suggests. “It is very easy to break, and when you put it back together, it doesn’t really go back the same.” That’s an issue in interpersonal relationships, but this current round of country hand-wringing about truth and lies may symbolize a greater urgency in the country at large. “I’m a big believer that whatever’s happening in culture, music is just the mirror of that,” Perry says. Dishonesty is arguably pulling the country apart. An Economist/YouG