David Archuleta has left on his two-year mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, but before departing he left us with a cover of R.E.M.’s touching ballad ‘Everybody Hurts.’

The young singer tackles some heavy subject matter with a video featuring war-zone soldiers missing their loved ones and a father of the bride who can’t bear to let go of his little girl. The runner-up of Season 7 of ‘American Idol‘ tries to inject some extra emotion into Michael Stipe’s words when he sings, “Don’t let yourself go / Cause everybody cries / And everybody hurts sometimes.”

Ultimately, all the folks in the video discover happy endings to their situations. Archuleta isn’t the star of the clip, but he does make brief appearances with studio footage taken from the recording of the song, which took place just one day before he left on his mission. Eyes closed, Archuleta croons the lyrics while a string section performs alongside.

‘Everybody Hurts’ appears on his latest album, ‘Begin.,’ which dropped earlier this month and sold 11,000 copies in its first week. Archuleta has sold more than 1 million albums worldwide in his career, mostly from his self-titled debut after Season 7 of ‘Idol’ aired.

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