Love Me Like You Used To Do

Album: Hard Headed Woman (2025)
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • "Love Me Like You Used To Do" is a melancholy duet between Margo Price and Tyler Childers on Price's fifth album, Hard Headed Woman. The song presents a tender yet complex portrait of a long-term relationship strained by hardship and dishonesty.
  • Price opens the song alone, sounding like someone who has already replayed the argument in her head and would now like a quieter ending. When Childers arrives in verse two, he corroborates. By the time they harmonize in the final verse, the song lands on its central truth: neither party is innocent, but the relationship might still be salvageable if they can get back to whatever it was before things grew complicated, suspicious, and expensive.
  • "Love Me Like You Used To Do" was written by Nashville songwriter Steven Knudson, a longtime friend of Price, and the recording functions partly as a public service announcement for one of the city's unheralded writers.
  • The duet is the first collaboration between Price and Childers on record, though they've long orbited the same stages and festivals. "Tyler is one of my favorite writers," Price told Uncut magazine. "He's truly one of the most prolific and phenomenal musicians. He opened some of my early shows, and now he has surpassed me in many ways, but we've just remained really good friends."
  • Recorded at RCA Studio A with producer Matt Ross-Spang, the album was Price's first full Nashville recording after years in Memphis and Los Angeles. It's a homecoming of sorts, fitting for a song about wanting things the way they used to be, only wiser this time.
  • The video, released in September 2025 and directed by Knudson, keeps the tone spare and human: black-and-white footage of Price and Childers working together at Sound Emporium, no storyline required. Like the song, it understands that sometimes the most revealing drama is simply two people standing in a room, trying to sing their way back to something honest.

Comments

Be the first to comment...

Editor's Picks

Philip Cody

Philip CodySongwriter Interviews

A talented lyricist, Philip helped revive Neil Sedaka's career with the words to "Laughter In The Rain" and "Bad Blood."

Michael Franti

Michael FrantiSongwriter Interviews

Franti tells the story behind his hit "Say Hey (I Love You)" and explains why yoga is an integral part of his lifestyle and his Soulshine tour.

Graham Parker

Graham ParkerSongwriter Interviews

When Judd Apatow needed under-appreciated rockers for his Knocked Up sequel, he immediately thought of Parker, who just happened to be getting his band The Rumour back together.

Dennis DeYoung

Dennis DeYoungSongwriter Interviews

Dennis DeYoung explains why "Mr. Roboto" is the defining Styx song, and what the "gathering of angels" represents in "Come Sail Away."

Chris Frantz of Talking Heads

Chris Frantz of Talking HeadsSongwriter Interviews

Talking Heads drummer Chris Frantz on where the term "new wave" originated, the story of "Naive Melody," and why they never recorded another cover song after "Take Me To The River."

Dar Williams

Dar WilliamsSongwriter Interviews

A popular contemporary folk singer, Williams still remembers the sticky note that changed her life in college.