Shania Twain Revealed Her Favorite Song She’s Written: ‘It’s Taken on So Many Lives of Its Own’
Shania Twain’s ability to combine pop melodies, country sounds, and meaningful lyrics took her to the top of the charts for over a decade. It’s always interesting to hear a gifted artist explain how they hone their craft, and Twain did just that during a recent podcast interview. With such an extensive career, does she have a favorite Shania Twain song herself?
It turns out, her favorite song she’s written remains her first big single.
Twain was a massive star throughout the ’90s and early 2000s
Shania Twain has survived a lot. She and her two sisters, Jill and Carrie Ann, grew up in poverty, often going to school hungry due to lack of food. Her circumstances were made worse by the actions of her stepfather, who sexually abused Twain and assaulted her mother.
Both of her parents died in a car accident when she was 22, leaving Twain and her siblings to look after each other. Twain always wanted to make music. But she didn’t release her first album until she was 27, and she later disowned it because of the lack of creative control.
Everything changed with her second record, The Woman in Me. The album is certified diamond and won the Grammy for Best Country Album in 1995. Her next two projects, Come On Over and Up!, also went diamond, making Twain the only female artist to achieve such a streak in the US. (Come On Over is also the highest-selling album from a solo female artist in American history.)
The Shania Twain song that kickstarted her career
Being a one-hit wonder is nothing to scoff at. But Twain’s repeated success on the charts speaks to her incredible knack for connecting with audiences. She talked about her songwriting process on an episode of the Best Friend Energy podcast.
Twain has collaborated with other musicians in the past, but she prefers to write in solitude. Writing is her outlet for exploring her thoughts about her life before synthesizing them into an anthemic song.
“I use it as escapism. I just love to go into my own little world and imagine these fabulous stories and write them into music,” she said. “Also, I’m writing about my own experiences, of course, so I’m venting kind of like a diary.”
Fans can have a good-natured argument over which of her hit songs is their favorite, but the answer is clear for Twain. “I guess if I was picking out of the classics, I would say ‘You’re Still the One‘ just because it’s taken on so many lives of its own through the lives of others and through the love of others,” she explained. “It’s a neverending story with the fans and the listeners. … It carries a lot of weight with me when I’m on stage. I just wanna hear everyone sing it back to me, and you know, feel their own story through it.”
The success of ‘You’re Still the One’
“You’re Still the One” is the third single on Come On Over. The song is a love ballad that doubles as a response from Twain to the media about her personal life.
The track’s producer and co-writer, Robert John “Mutt” Lange, was also Twain’s husband at the time. As explained on Country Thang Daily, the relationship was met with plenty of skepticism. Some thought Twain was using him to advance her career. Others were concerned with the 17-year age difference between her and Lange.
The couple didn’t intend to write a song defending their love — they wrote parts of “You’re Still the One” independently. But the outside noise clearly impacted their creativity.
The song was Twain’s first top-10 hit in America, peaking at number two on the Billboard Hot 100. It was nominated for four Grammy Awards, winning in the Best Country Song and Best Female Country Vocal Performance categories.
Shania Twain’s new songs: She’s back after a health-induced break
For years, it was unclear if Twain would ever release a new record.
An unfortunate tick bite in 2004 led to the singer contracting Lyme disease. Twain battled the illness for years, temporarily losing her voice in the process. Her personal life was also in a state of flux. Twain and Lange divorced in 2010 because he had cheated on her with her best friend, Marie-Anne Thiébaud. Twain remarried a year later, her new beau being Frédéric Thiébaud, Marie-Anne’s ex-husband.
She released her comeback album, Now, in 2017 and her latest work, Queen of Me, in February. Twain’s life and career up to her sixth album were commemorated in the documentary Not Just a Girl, which was released on Netflix in 2022.
The Joss Crowley-directed doc chronicles Twain’s rags-to-riches story and includes interviews with the singer, her contemporaries, and younger artists inspired by her work.
