About The Song
“It Matters to Me” is a song written by Ed Hill and Mark D. Sanders and recorded by American country music artist Faith Hill. It was released in November 1995 as the second single and title track from Hill’s second album of the same name (1995). It was her third number one on the Billboard country charts as well as her first entry to the Hot 100.
At this point of the nineties, female artists were doing most of the creative heavy lifting. Faith Hill was part of the second wave of major female artists to break through, and like her contemporaries Martina McBride and Shania Twain, she had to strive for the high bar being set by Mary Chapin Carpenter, Patty Loveless, Pam Tillis, Wynonna, and Trisha Yearwood.
Her growth as an artist was apparent on her second album, which only produced one No. 1 hit, but was consistently excellent from start to finish. The title track is among its best moments.
“It Matters to Me” is one of those rare songs that comes along and puts into words a human experience that hadn’t been well captured in song before. It addresses the emotional neglect embedded in the silent treatment, and how that way of fighting can be more debilitating and insidiously damaging than even the cruelest words spoken aloud.
“Baby tell me where’d you ever learn,” she wonders, “to fight without saying a word?” The chorus has a gorgeous melody and the track has a gorgeous piano hook, but “It Matters to Me” is all about that insightful lyric and Hill’s stunning vocal performance. She cracks with emotion at all the right places, while also communicating a resolve that she will not remain in a relationship that is not sustainable: “Tell me…how you can love like this, ’cause I’m not sure I can.”
This one’s an absolute classic, and among the best performances from a legend among her generation of performers.
Video
Lyrics
Baby tell me where’d you ever learn
To fight without sayin’ a word
Then waltz back into my life
Like it’s all gonna be alright
Don’t you know how much it hurts
When we don’t talk
When we don’t touch
When it doesn’t feel like we’re even in love
It matters to me
When I don’t know what to say
Don’t know what to do
Don’t know if it really even matters to you
How can I make you see
It matters to me
Maybe I still don’t understand
The distance between a woman and a man
So tell me how far it is
And how you can love like this
‘Cause I’m not sure I can
When we don’t talk
When we don’t touch
When it doesn’t feel like we’re even in love
It matters to me
When I don’t know what to say
Don’t know what to do
Don’t know if it really even matters to you
How can I make you see
It matters to me
Whoa I don’t know what to say
Don’t know what to do
Don’t know if it really even matters to you
How can I make you see
Oh, it matters to me
Oh, it matters to me
It matters to me
