Brad Paisley and Carrie Underwood sparked a wave of emotions in 2011 with an explosive duet of their song “Remind Me.”
The song was released in May 2011 as the third single from Paisley’s critically acclaimed album, This Is Country Music. It reached the top of the Hot Country Songs chart and was named Taste of Country’s Song of The Year for 2011.
A Song About Husband And Wife Rekindling Their Romance
Written by Brad Paisley with songwriters Kelley Lovelace and Chris DuBois, “Remind Me” tells the emotional tale of a married couple desperately trying to reignite the flame of their relationship they once carried.
“It’s about the conversation a couple would have. It could be seven months into the relationship, or it could be seven years, but everybody’s been there,” Paisley revealed to The Boot. “You could be fifteen years old on your first dating relationship and wondering why you don’t feel the way you did five or six months ago about this person. I love the honesty in that song.”
The song was inspired in part by Loretta Lynn and Conway Twitty duet “Louisiana Woman, Mississippi Man.” However, instead of a standard duet structure where the girl and guy trade verses, “Remind Me” was a question and answer between two singers.
“Remember the airport dropping me off? We were kissing goodbye, and we couldn’t stop. I felt bad cause you missed your flight, but that meant we had one more night. Do you remember how it used to be? We’d turn out the lights and didn’t just sleep. Remind me, baby remind me,” the song goes.
For You
Paisley also revealed that Underwood was the first person he called to sing with him on the song. “She’s probably pretty much my first choice to sing with when it comes to a duet with a woman like that,” Paisley said. “I mean, we just sort of share the same values and get along that well. And also, I just don’t think there’s a better singer than her, so it’s sort of selfish to be able to sing with her and perform. Every take sounded like that [the final recording].”
But The Emotional Ballad Ended Up In A Lawsuit
However, songwriter Amy Bowen, who once lived in Nashville and was professionally known as Lizza Connor, filed a lawsuit claiming Brad Paisley and his “Remind Me” co-writers stole an idea from one of her compositions.
Bowen wrote a song called “Remind Me” in 2007 and played it around Nashville over the next few years, including during a 2008 workshop where writers DuBois and Lovelace were advisors. Bowen alleged that the two songwriters once told her the song would work well as a duet, and then they copied the tune and reworked it for Paisley and Underwood. She asked for ten million dollars, claiming Paisley and Underwood’s use of the phrases “Remind me” and “Baby, remind me” were the same as her version of the song.
After a lengthy court battle, U.S. District Judge Aleta Trauger eventually sided with Paisley, DuBois, and Lovelace. She ruled in 2016 that there were “broader dissimilarities in context, structure, mood, melody, and harmony” between the two songs in question.
An Unforgettable Grand Ole Opry Performance From Two Icons
In August 2012, the longtime friends dropped by the iconic venue of Grand Ole Opry for the performance of a lifetime. Brad Paisley kicked off the performance solo before Underwood’s powerful voice was heard all over the concert hall – just in time for the chorus. The audience went wild as the talented vocalist started to cross the stage, thrilling the crowd with her exceptional appearance.
You can watch the performance of two talented singers in the video below.
