Maddie & Tae were hoping to hide the hurt when they sat down to write with Jonathan Singleton and Deric Ruttan. It didn't work, as you can tell from listening to the lyrics of "Die From a Broken Heart," a very personal, very effective heartbreak song from their One Heart to Another EP.

The country duo say Singleton suggested the title, which felt like fate.

“Personally, I was like ‘I feel that way right now," Maddie Marlow tells Taste of Country. "That sounds like a phone conversation between me and my mom."

“I felt like I was dying," Tae Dye adds, laughing at her own melodrama.

"Sometimes," Marlow continues, "you’re in so much pain and your heart hurts so bad that you just don’t if you’re going to come out of it. We just wanted to capture what that phone call's like.”

"How does he sleep at night / Mama, the nerve of this guy / To leave me, so easy / Am I gonna be alright? / I wanna kick myself for fallin' so hard / Mama, can you die from a broken heart?" they ask at the chorus.

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Marlow was set to marry her longtime boyfriend at the time, so her heartbreak wasn't personal in that sense. Dye didn't expand on hers, but she and longtime boyfriend Jackie Lee broke up around the same time they transitioned from the shuttered Dot Records to UMG Nashville, which was when "Die From a Broken Heart" was written. They were at a career crossroads.

"Can your knees give out from praying so hard / Can you go blind from crying in the dark / Was it ever really real / If he don't feel like I feel," Maddie & Tae sing at the bridge of "Die From a Broken Heart." 

"For me at that time, it felt like a failure when really it was just a stepping stone to get where we are now," Marlow says. "Sometimes you have to fall on your butt a little bit and like fail to get to that success that you want."

They're better for it — they agree — and would do it all over again to get to today. Dye's personal heartache eventually led to a new relationship, so now both women know what it looks like on the other side of a storm. Fan stories have come the same way. One fan sent a thank you note to the duo, sharing her breakup story. The were engaged, but it all blew up.

"I was like 'Oh my gosh,'" Dye recalls. "I had gone through my own breakup so I was like 'Girl, I feel ya. Stay strong. You got this!' A month ago she messaged us and told us that the engagement worked out and they got back together and she was happy ... I just have chills thinking about it."

Maddie & Tae's "Die From a Broken Heart" Lyrics:

Hey Momma, how do you get a red wine stain / Out of your favorite dress / Black mascara off a pillow case / Cure a one-too-many headache / Momma can I come and maybe stay a few days / This weekend or next / And hey, how do you get a red wine stain out of your favorite dress.

Chorus:
How does he sleep at night? / Momma, the nerve of this guy / To leave me so easy / Am I gonna be alright? / I wanna kick myself for falling so hard / Momma, can you die from a broken heart?

Can you ask Daddy if he's got time / To come and look at my front door / It got slammed last night and now it don't close right / And just promise that you won't tell him everything / And keep that pistol in the drawer / Momma, please don't say
I'm gonna laugh about this someday / You didn't see the way he drove away.

Repeat Chorus

Can your knees give out from praying so hard / Can you go blind from crying in the dark / Was it ever really real / If he don't feel like I feel.

Repeat Chorus

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