Better Life

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"Better Life" is a #1 country song by Keith Urban written with Richard Marx. It was released in 2005 as the fourth single from Urban's 2004 album, Be Here. It spent six weeks atop Billboard's Hot Country Songs chart and became Urban's seventh song to top that chart. The song also went to #44 on Billboard's Hot 100.

The mid-to-uptempo song is driven by a chugging banjo part set against a distinctive drum pattern. The message of an optimistic future prevailing over current struggles pervades the lyrics, summarized by the chorus:

Someday baby,

You and I are gonna be the ones ...

Good luck's gonna shine.

Ooh, someday baby,

You and I are gonna be the ones, so —

Ho-old on, we're headed for a better life!

Urban's electric guitar playing further decorates the song, especially in its outro.

The music video for "Better Life" portrayed Urban and his band playing the song in a Los Angeles culvert, intercut with scenes of a struggling young pair of lovers having their ups and downs, and finally ending up in the culvert to watch Urban. In April 2006 Urban won the CMT Music Awards Video of the Year for it. Urban closed that awards show with a live performance of the song, featuring a long interpolation of Bruce Springsteen's "The Rising" and backing vocals from a large choir consisting of displaced persons from the previous summer's Hurricane Katrina.