Introduction
It wasn’t just a performance. It was an ambush. When Linda Ronstadt stepped into the song “The Waiting”, she didn’t merely sing—she detonated. Every note hit like a blade, slicing through decades of false comfort and exposing what millions secretly feared: that waiting, longing, and yearning can feel like torture disguised as hope.
Audiences who thought they knew Linda—the golden-voiced siren of country-rock and pop balladry—were blindsided. “The Waiting” wasn’t delivered as a gentle plea. It was unleashed as a primal cry, the sound of a woman tearing through the polite fabric of patience and revealing the raw nerves underneath. People in the crowd didn’t just listen—they gasped. Some even admitted later that they felt the air leave their lungs as if they’d been struck.
And that’s the shock: at a stage in her career when many expected Ronstadt to coast on nostalgia, she chose confrontation. She transformed a well-worn song into a livewire of defiance. Her voice—once praised for its clarity and sweetness—turned into something dangerous, almost unbearable in its intensity. It wasn’t the sound of entertainment. It was the sound of a reckoning.
The aftermath? Fans walked out shaken, some in tears, others stunned silent. Music critics struggled to capture what had happened, describing it as everything from a “spiritual exorcism” to “a public stripping of the soul.”
This is why Linda Ronstadt’s “The Waiting” still echoes like a shockwave: because it wasn’t just music—it was truth. And the truth, when delivered with that kind of force, doesn’t soothe. It scorches.
Video
Lyrics
Oh, baby don’t it feel like heaven right now
Don’t it feel like something from a dream
Hey, I’ve never known nothing quite like thisDon’t it feel like the night might never be again
Baby we know better than to try and pretend
Honey, no one could’ve ever told me about this
I said, “Yeah yeah, yeah yeah yeah yeah”The waiting is the hardest part
Every day you see one more card
You take it on faith, you take it to the heart
The waiting is the hardest partWell yeah, you might’ve chased a couple women around
Oh, all it ever got you is down
Yeah then there were those that made me feel good
But never as good as I feel right nowBaby you’re the only one that’s ever known how
To make me want to live like I want to live now
I said, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah”The waiting is the hardest part
Every day you get one more yard
You take it on faith, you take it to the heart
The waiting is the hardest partOh, don’t let it kill you babe
Don’t let it get to you
Don’t let it kill you babe
Don’t let it get to youI’ll be your bleeding heart, I’ll be your crying fool
Don’t let this go too far don’t let it get to you
I said, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah”The waiting is the hardest part
Every day you get one more yard
You take it on faith, you take it to the heart
The waiting is the hardest part
The waiting is the hardest partIt’s the hardest part, it’s the hardest part
