3 Love Songs From the 70s That Were Real-Life Apologies

You can always tell when songs were written with real feelings. Here are a few songs from the 70s that were inspired by real situations where apologies were needed.

“Jealous Guy” by John Lennon

As Yoko Ono shared with Uncut, per Songfacts, “Jealous Guy” was written about a type of jealousy that doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with another person. John Lennon and Yoko Ono met in 1966 and got married a few years later.

“[Lennon] was jealous about the fact that I had another language in my head, you know, Japanese, that he can’t share with me,” she explained. “It was almost on a very conceptual, spiritual level. It wasn’t on a level of physical or anything ’cause I just would never give him a reason for that.”

The lyrics of this song, which read like an apology, are pretty straightforward.

“I didn’t mean to hurt you / I’m sorry that I made you cry / Oh my I didn’t want to hurt you / I’m just a jealous guy.“

“Baby Come Back” by Player

Founders of Player, Peter Beckett and J. C. Crowley, wrote this song about breakups that they were both going through at the time. It was through their mutual pain that this song was created, and that Player got a record deal. The lyrics are extremely apologetic, especially in the chorus.

Baby come back, any kind of fool could see
There was something in everything about you
Baby come back, you can blame it all on me
I was wrong and I just can’t live without you.

“Always On My Mind” by Elvis Presley

Songwriter Wayne Carson penned “Always On My Mind”. It ended up being recorded by Willie Nelson, and then later Elvis Presley. Inspiration for the song struck when Carson was talking to his wife on the phone, explaining that he had to extend a trip he was on in Memphis, Tennessee. Apparently, she was pretty upset.

“I said, ‘Well, I know I’ve been gone a lot, but I’ve been thinking about you all the time.’ And it just struck me like someone had hit me with a hammer,” he told The LA Times. “I told her real fast I had to hang up because I had to put that into a song.”

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