Don't Think I Can't Love You

Owen penned this together with his producer Jimmy Ritchey and Kendal Marvel. Definitely a masculine love song, it is about a guy who can't afford to spoil the people he loves with material things. Jake Owen wrote it at a time when he was feeling the same sort of internal strain, working hard and still not being able to provide the finer things in life.
"The first line in the song is, 'I learned the hard way real early in life that money doesn't grow on trees.' My dad taught my brother and I how to work hard for it," remembers Jake. "And he always said, 'I may not be able to give you, your brother, or your mom the best things in life, but I can love you all more than anything, and that's what's gonna keep our family together. Not money.' And I just wanted to write that.
But it's coming from a guy's perspective in the song to this girl saying he can't buy her the finer things in life, big houses on the hill, or a big diamond ring for her finger. But don't think that I can't love you. And I think that it's a really strong way of singing a love song and lyrically putting it out there without overdoing it with cliché cheesy lines. It's just laying it out there on the table, which is the way it is, and it's how I feel.
I just think it's a figure of speech, and even if you do have a whole lot of things in life, or money, that's not what matters. And I've seen plenty of people with very little in their life be unbelievably happy. And I've seen a lot of people with a whole lot of money that are miserable. And I'd rather take the former."

"It's really important for me when I'm writing songs that speak to women that I speak to them in a way of respect, first of all," says Jake. "And secondly, I try to write in a way where a guy listening would say, 'Man, I'd say that to a girl.' Hopefully that guy finds things that he wishes he could say, and he can use my music as the avenue for it. Conway Twitty did that. He sang songs to women all the time, but it was a very masculine way of saying it. It wasn't soft." (Check out our interview with Jake Owen)

At a show in Vero Beach, Florida on April 7th, 2012, Owen proposed to his girlfriend Lacey Buchanan during a performance of this song. Said Jake, "When I was on stage, it just hit me how many of our family members and friends were at the show. So, I thought sharing that moment would mean a lot to everyone."