Waitin’ on a Woman

Waitin’ on a Woman

When I hear a Brad Paisley song on the radio, right off the bat I usually take some minor offense at the stereotypes he’s exploiting. But if I don’t change the station immediately, I find myself relating to and agreeing with those stereotypes. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not, but in “Waitin’ on a Woman,” the stereotype of a woman running late rings especially true. Maybe it’s your wife/girlfriend, your mom or your sister (or all of the above *wink*), but there’s no denying we’ve all been there. And it’s framed in the context of some shared wisdom between different generations of men, so the content of this song hits you from two fronts at once: the relationship between you and the woman you’ve waited on, and the kind of bonding men or women experience while talking about their significant others.

Written by Don Sampson and Wynn Varble^[1], this is a fine example of contemporary country that doesn’t suck. There are even some great steel swells and licks that give this tune some extra emotional grab. The pre-chorus offers a nice soaring contrast to the low-key verses, and then the chorus brings it back down and wraps the phrasing up nicely. The A A B B C, A A B B C, Bridge, B C, Coda structure seems a little complicated, but works well in this song—and Brad even kept his talented guitar wankery confined to a short instrumental bridge and a coda, so radio can cut him off if they like.

Vocally, the verses were the hardest for me to get right since they lie somewhere between being spoken and sung. After trying it out, I’ll point out that Brad pulls that off exceptionally well.