About The Song
Trisha Yearwood reaches her commercial peak.
After “Believe Me Baby (I Lied)” became her sixth No. 1 hit, the title track from Everybody Knows went top five, followed by the top forty hit “I Need You.” Yearwood then changed producers, enlisting Tony Brown to co-produce some of the new material on her first hits collection, {Songbook}. Thanks to the lead single from this collection, Yearwood reached new commercial heights and swept the industry awards in the eighteen months that followed.
LeAnn Rimes was originally enlisted to record “How Do I Live” at the request of its songwriter, Diane Warren, who was asked to write the song for the film Con Air. Upon hearing Rimes’ recording, the producers felt a more mature performance was needed to capture the feelings of the older characters in the film. Yearwood learned the song by listening to Rimes’ version, and was surprised to learn that Rimes’ label would also be releasing “How Do I Live” to country radio.
While some radio stations spliced the Yearwood and Rimes versions together, and Rimes’ version cracked the top fifty of the country singles chart, country radio embraced Yearwood’s version, powering it to No. 1 on the genre chart, while Rimes’ take became a massive pop hit.
Diane Warren’s ballads aren’t exactly known for their subtlety, and “How Do I Live” was written for an over the top Nicolas Cage movie. So it’s to Yearwood’s credit that she is able to ground “How Do I Live” in realistic emotion, giving a tender and thoughtful reading to the lyrics and supplying a subtlety that is completely absent from the lyric itself.
Yearwood sings with more power than usual, but it’s never overpowering. This time period gave us a brief window into what Yearwood’s career could’ve been like if she’d emphasized radio friendly material all along the way. Unsurprisingly, she does it better than anyone else, even if it still feels like she’s fighting well below her weight class here.“How Do I Live” kicks off a string of four consecutive No. 1 singles, and we’ll cover them all in the coming weeks. It also won her a Grammy for Best Female Country Vocal Performance.
Video
Lyrics
How do I
Get through one night without you?
If I had to live without you
What kind of life would that be?
Oh now
I need you in my arms need you to hold
You’re my world my heart my soul
If you ever leave
Baby you would take away everything good in my lifeWithout you
There’d be no sun in my sky
There would be no love in my life
There’d be no world left for me
And I, baby I don’t know what I would do
I’d be lost if I lost you
If you ever leave
Baby you would take away everything real in my life
And tell me nowHow do I live without you?
I want to know
How do I breathe without you?
If you ever go
How do I ever, ever survive?
How do I, how do I, oh how do I live?