Gunpowder & Lead

Album: Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (2007)
Charted: 52
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Songfacts®:

  • In this song the narrator is sitting by the door one night with a gun, waiting for her abusive man to come home from jail. Lambert says the song was inspired by abused women who her family would take in over the years, and in particular one woman who came in crying with a black eye. Seeing firsthand what domestic abuse could do to a woman and her family, she wrote the song from their perspective.
  • Lambert is licensed to carry a handgun, and has a tattoo with two revolvers in the design on her forearm.
  • This was co-written by Miranda Lambert and Heather Little. The latter also co-wrote Lambert's 2003 debut single "Me and Charlie Talking."
  • Miranda Lambert from her publicity materials: "Heather Little and I have written a lot together, but I haven't cut a lot of those songs yet. She lives in the house I grew up in, right down the street from us. I had one day at home to write, and we sat in her kitchen. We had the whole song written except for the line about what little girls are made of. The next day, I was in my concealed handgun class, and I was calling Heather on the breaks every hour. My dad kept saying, "you're not paying attention, you're gonna fail the test." I was thinking, what's actually in bullets, what are they made of? And then the words 'gunpowder and lead' just popped into my head. That song talks about real things - drinking and fighting - and we need to bring all that back to Country music."
  • Lambert got "Country Road 233," where the song opens, from the Oxygen TV show Snapped, which is about female killers. Lambert says she was watching an episode where an abused woman shot her boyfriend in his bedroom on Country Road 233 and left him there, where he wasn't found for two years. She used that location for the setting in her song.

Comments: 9

  • Babydolls from OhWalk a mile in the shoes of an abused spouse, this case, a wife, who gets beaten every day/night for something as simple as NOTHING. The something is something he made up or just felt he was justified in doing it cause he can. Maybe she is afraid of having his arrested cause she has done it before. And when he got out he beat her even more and worse then before. If you walk a mile in her shoes, you might think differently. Miranda is one who don't take that foolishness. I can't help but wonder if he ever again slapped her face and shook her like a rag doll. And if not, was it because that shotgun blast heard at the end, was NOT a warning shot? In the video, she is seen digging what believe is his grave. Two songs about the same subject, but each wife handles it differently.
  • Andrea from Andreagseiner@hotmail.com, TnOk I have a opinion about this...and mine is this is just a song...but if this was a true story...he beat her and obviously it wasn't the first time and then he goes to jail and is heading back to her again angry now WHAT Landon do you think he was going to do to her? Give her a box of chocolates and some flowers...he was going to finish what he started. And don't say I don't know that ...because I was in a abusive marriage when I was younger. And they don't stop
  • Megan from Stevenson, AlCompletely awesome song! You go Miranda! Get 'em girl:)
  • Breanna from Henderson, NvLandon: What are you talking about! You know what, most women that are beaten, they don't believe the woman! I agree with Olivia, you must be off your rocker to believe that. Do you know why these women wright these songs, because most average beaten women are afraid to go out there and get help but with songs like these they do get the courage to do it. You know what, that's just sad that you would feel that way. Just too bad for you, not getting why a song's wrote and to just brush it aside when it does give women courage to not take it so far as the song, but to go get help.
  • Janet from Charlotte, NcGettin beaten on a regular basis is like a slow tortuous death. you obviously have no idea what your talking about. ever heard of self defense. 'hurt them a little bit', you have got to be kidding by writing that. how about men who kick their pregnant wives, killing a fetus. you need an education on domestic violent. this song rocks just like independence day does.
  • Michele from Raleigh, NcLandon: Apparently no woman you have loved or cared about has been beaten up...........
  • Theresa from Murfreesboro, TnMiranda knows how to write a flawless country tune, her talent cannot be matched and this song proves that!
  • Olivia from Chicago, IlTo Landon: If you read the lyrics i think you'll find that the character in the song was not 'hurt a little bit'. Find a doll, now shake it. Imagine that on a human. I don't think you appreciate how much abuse messes a person up. Also clearly the man who abuseed her did not get a full life sentence. I'm not condoning vigilante justice but she's not making something out of nothing
  • Landon from Winchester, OhThis song is rediculous. I feel sympathetic for woman out there that are beaten and abused by their jerk husbands, but a sentencing to life in prison is the proper way to handle it. Shooting the man for hurting her? That's lower than the abuse itself! I'm pretty damn tired of women getting by with writing songs about killing husbands because they hurt them a little bit, because how much better are they in reality? Miranda Lambert sucks.
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