Album: single release only (2011)
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Songfacts®:

  • This is a single released by Jaron Lowenstein, who records as Jaron and the Long Road to Love. The song is a duet with Big Kenny, one half of the Country music duo Big & Rich, and was released on May 31, 2011.
  • Though Lowenstein had never met Big Kenny before they wrote this song they already had a connection. 11 years previously Jaron and his twin brother Evan cut "Contemplating," the first song Big Kenny ever had that was recorded by somebody else.
  • Lowenstein and Big Kenny finally got together after a buddy introduced them over e-mail. Initially the plan was just to chat, but after Kenny's little boy asked them to sing, Lowenstein got out his guitar and started playing "Contemplating," and Kenny joined in. He recalled to The Boot: "We had this amazing connection and harmony. We played the whole song, while his little boy was dancing. That's really what inspired us to write. Kenny said, 'What's on your mind?' I told him, 'I have this idea for a song called 'Beautiful Lies.'' Then I just saw his eyes go somewhere else, and he walked away and grabbed his own guitar, and immediately starts singing, 'Lie to me, oh lie to me …'
    Lowenstein was impressed, "I'm like, "I love that melody. What is that?," he recalled: "He just got really into that song. I was just hearing him with my guitar ... We opened up, started throwing out lines and the song just happened. Strange process, but it was nothing like I had ever experienced. It was incredible."
  • A tune that Jaron and his twin brother Evan wrote, "It's a Good Thing," was originally earmarked to be the first single. However after, he and Big Kenny posted a YouTube video of themselves performing this song, fans began to react in the same way that they did to "Pray For You." This left Lowenstein in a quandary. He told The Boot: "I called Big Kenny and said, 'I don't know what to do. I have 'It's a Good Thing' as a single and we are staying the course. But I can't stop this. I think this might get picked up by radio even though it's not the single.' And he's so spiritual. He said, 'We can't interfere with art.' It's like that old saying, 'Man makes plans, and God laughs.' It's been incredibly humbling to me because right out of the gate, I felt like 'Pray For You' was an amazing thing happening, but with 'Beautiful Lies,' I was the last to know."

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