Dancing in a Hurricane: The 10 Songs about Rain that Mean the Most to Me

Time to ride the wind and dance in a hurricane.

It rained torrentially where I live this week–and last–in Chicago, and it reminded me of my relationship to gloomy weather–and of the sizable number of songs that discuss rain as literal or symbolic of a state of mind.

Gary Allan’s 2003 country hit, “Songs about Rain,” reinforces the link between rain and longing and loss in music, as Allan sings about someone hearing song after song about rain on the radio, including such classics as Brook Benton’s “Rainy Night in Georgia” and Elvis Presley’s “Kentucky Rain,” after an ex gets married.

These examples show how often rain has been used in different forms of music as a symbol of lost love and grief, sometimes to hide such experiences: think of the Temptations’ “I Wish It Would Rain” and the Dramatics’ “In the Rain.”

But simultaneously, there are songs where rain is used as a symbol of resilience, including Allan’s “Every Storm (Runs Out of Rain)” and at least a few that made my list of my favorite songs about rain–the top 10 songs about rain that mean the most to me.

My own relationship with rain has shifted over time because of these songs. I struggle with seasonal depression, especially in wintertime, but listening to many songs about rain reminds me of my own strength and resilience, no matter how much such qualities seem to waver from day to day. Internalizing messages from positive songs comes more easily to me because of my literal-minded brain as autistic.

I’ve realized that in American popular music, at least, rain symbolizes obstacles, but the attitude towards those obstacles depends on the song and its writers and performers. I’ve heard it said that all music is performative (I believe I read it in an essay by Barbara Ching), but that doesn’t mean I perceive such music as performative, with some level of artifice. These songs, among many others that didn’t make my list, changed my life, regardless of how genuinely they were written or performed.

This is not a list of the ten “best” songs about rain or even my ten “favorite” songs about rain–it’s about the ones that mean the most to me and have embodied and sometimes shifted my relationship to rain–literal or symbolic.

10. “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain,” Willie Nelson

In 1975, Willie Nelson released his bare-bones album, Red Headed Stranger, and his version of the 1940s classic “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain” became his breakthrough hit as a singer. This is one of my favorite country records ever, with rain a symbol of loneliness echoing the stark production and arrangement. Nelson’s inimitable jazz-influenced phrasing makes the narrator’s heartbreak palpable. I first heard this record as a kid, and even though I love high-production country music from many eras, the record struck me with its notable simplicity–and not just for its era. This is an all time classic.

9. “Fire and Rain,” James Taylor

Writing this after a friend’s suicide in a mental institution where James Taylor was staying, this 1970 record, featuring sympathetic backing with Russ Kunkel on drums and Taylor’s trademark acoustic guitar work, has moved me since I first heard it over a quarter-century ago. Rain is more of a metaphor here, but the tumult and chaos in Taylor’s life is palpable throughout. It’s a sensitive-sounding record, though not overbearing or sentimental. You can feel Taylor’s pain in his understated vocal. This song reminds me that, as Mariah Carey once sang, I can make it through the rain, metaphorical and otherwise, symbolic of trauma or anything else.

8. “Walking in the Rain,” The Ronettes 

In the Ronettes’ underappreciated “Walking in the Rain,” a storm provides a (literally) thunderous backdrop to a record that sounds like pure sunshine, despite the longing. Veronica Bennett's (later Ronnie Spector) quivering “whoa-oh-ohhhh” interjections convey teenage longing unusually well. This is one of my favorite love songs ever, even though it’s about unrequited love. Hearing it as a kid, I was struck by its unusually epic sound, even for producer Phil Spector’s records. Rain represents idyllic romance here; walking in it without interference sounds like a more positive vision of rain than many records.

7. “I’m No Stranger to the Rain,” Keith Whitley

To my ears, Keith Whitley was the most moving country singer of the 1980s. In “I’m No Stranger to the Rain,” rain represents chaos and tumult, and the message of the song is that the narrator keeps on trucking, so to speak, through the storms of life, though there are prophetic kernels of doubt in the lyrics and the vocal. Whitley’s promising career was cut short the following year with his tragic death from alcoholism, but “I’m No Stranger to the Rain” made a lasting message for survivors of all kinds–and a symbolic record for me. I see my life as one where I “ride the wind and dance in a hurricane” amidst all the trials and tribulations thrown my way. I’m proud of that, and this song exemplifies that spirit of triumph.

6. “Early Mornin’ Rain,” Peter, Paul and Mary

It might sound strange, but growing up in the 1990s, the most important music group of my childhood was ‘60s folk trio Peter, Paul and Mary. Some of their hits don’t hold up as well when I listen to them today, but at least one still stands out to my ears. The group’s version of the emerging songwriter Gordon Lightfoot’s “Early Mornin’ Rain” is less stilted than other hits they had, with gorgeous, delicate harmonies and a surer sense of (gentle) rhythm. Rain here symbolizes desolation, with the narrator stranded, “cold and drunk” after a lover has left on a plane overhead. This record holds up better than most folk of the era.

5. “Rain King” (live acoustic), Counting Crows

Counting Crows have rarely struck me as a great band, but I adore this slow-burning version of a song from their huge debut, 1993’s August and Everything After, performed on VH1 Storytellers with countrified electric guitar and harmonies and released on the album Across a Wire: Live in New York City. Though I’ve never read Saul Bellow’s novel Henderson the Rain King, I understand rain to connote suffering here. The crashing backbeat on the studio version is gone and the earnest delivery heightened, but my favorite moment is in the harmonies leading up to the last chorus: “And I deserve a little mmooooooorrrrrrrrrrrre.” Don’t we all?

4. “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall,” Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan’s early folk records could be ambiguously moving, but “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall,” also released on the 1963 album The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan, is a different kind of soul-stirring. Here the hard rain represents the specter of nuclear war, with the lyrics unfolding as answers to questions asked to an ostensibly innocent “blue-eyed son.” Dylan’s solo acoustic performance may sound naive, especially compared to the Staple Singers’ version, but the record still strikes me as exceptionally powerful for the song itself. Unlike some songs on this list, the rainfall is not literal, but the image is so chilling in the song’s context that I had to include it here.

3. “Purple Rain,” Prince and the Revolution

Even though I don’t know what purple rain is or represents, if this were a list of the best songs about rain, I would probably put this at #1. From the spare guitar chords to the electrifying climax to the mournful closing strings, this just might be my favorite record of the 1980s. Recorded live with the multi-instrumentalist genius Prince and his band, the Revolution, and released on the 1984 soundtrack to the star vehicle film of the same name, “Purple Rain” is a truly epic record, and even though I don’t know Prince’s body of work as well as many, this song has long been a favorite of mine.

2. “Rain,” Patty Griffin

Patty Griffin’s “Rain” is the first song on an album, 2002’s 1,000 Kisses, that got me interested in listening to my favorite singer-songwriter of the last three decades. Her voice is astonishingly clear, but the simplicity of the lyrics and the production make this an especially well written song–and well conceived record. When I rave about Patty Griffin, this is the kind of song that exemplifies her work. Rain represents turmoil here, but by the end, it’s clear that resilience will win the battle against hardship and suffering.

1. “Like the Rain,” Clint Black

For those who know how much I love this song and how it changed my life, this will come as no surprise. I’m not saying this is necessarily a better record than “Purple Rain,” but it’s the song about rain that means the most to me–in large part because more than any other song about rain that I know, it represents triumph. The narrator in the song ends up seeing rain as something to love rather than as an obstacle. The song changed my relationship with rain, but more than that, it changed my relationship with myself. Cheers to that.