Sometimes a song says sorry better than we ever could. Music can capture the awkwardness, the guilt, and the hope of an apology in a way words alone often cannot.
Sometimes a song can apologize better than we could during a normal conversation. That’s because music captures things in a way simple words can’t, including awkwardness (cue the song Introducing Me by Nick Jonas.)
I’ve apologized plenty of times in my life, and I’m okay with admitting that. I’ve said sorry in normal conversations, through text messages and sometimes even through gifts. Still, I don’t always hit the mark like I want to. I’m horrible at expressing emotions properly, and what I want to say doesn’t get through properly. So, when I hear a song about regret or asking for forgiveness, I’m all about it. The voice, the lyrics, it all does what I can’t.
Songs that say sorry hit home so well because they’re easy to relate to. Everyone’s made mistakes, and we’ve all wanted to say sorry at some point in our lives and struggled to find the right way to do so. Music makes it easier because it reminds us that struggle is normal. It’s both comforting and relieving to know that someone else understands what carrying that feeling of guilt can do.
Music teaches us that saying sorry isn’t always easy, but that doesn’t make it not worth trying. The song doesn’t always expect us to get it right. It just asks that we feel the emotion and give it our best shot anyway.
Apologies in music are an art form because they are simple and direct, but they’re still so full of emotion. They speak across time, situations, and relationships. They remind us that being human means that sometimes we’ll make mistakes, feel things we don’t want to (like regret) and sometimes the music says what our hearts (and our mouths) can’t.
