BEHIND THE SONG: "Gimmie That Girl"

On Monday, June 14th, Joe Nichols gathered his Music Row buddies to celebrate one of the biggest hits of his career “Gimmie That Girl.” Joe pinpoints the success of his third number one single to it reliability. He explains, “I think the girl in the song is like any girl, like any woman out there. Sometimes when she doesn’t think that she’s sexy or hot or doesn’t think she’s pretty, somebody’s in love with her, sombody’s checkin’ her out, somebody notices.” He adds, “I think the special thing about this song is that guys really feel like this. When they’re in a relationship with a girl, they’ll start noticing things that just guys passing by wouldn’t notice.”

Joe also notes that the song wouldn’t have made it to the top of the charts without his fans. He says, “There’s only so much promoting you can do…in the end, it comes down to one thing: the connection with the fans and what do they think of what you do. And, if they respond, if they connect like they did with “Gimmie Me That Girl,” then you’ve got a huge song. It’s the difference between having a hit and a big hit.”

For songwriters Rhett Akins, Dallas Davidson and Ben Hayslip, “Gimmie That Girl” was quite a departure from the usual material that the trio writes together which Rhett likes to refer to as “chicks, trucks and beer songs” and the change was inspired by Dallas. Rhett reveals, “At this particular time in our lives, Dallas had just met his now wife. He had known her for about two months and he was highly in love, the dew was still on the love.” He continues, “I think he wanted to impress his new girlfriend with a love song instead of a chicks, trucks, honky-tonk, dirt road anthem and it worked out really well.”

Not only did it win Dallas some points with the lady in his life, it also was a big hit with their friends. Rhett explains, “Every time I got a text message or a phone call on this song, it was, ‘It is my favorite song on the radio.’ We knew girls would like it, but when your redneck buddies are callin’ going, ‘Hey, man. I’m tellin’ ya this song’s awesome,’ then you know you’ve got a good song when the guys are callin’ when it’s a love song.”

In an interesting turn of events, Rhett, Dallas and Ben wrote Joe’s next single from his album Old Things New, a song called “The Shape I’m In” which was inspired by Dallas’ relationship with an ex-girlfriend. Rhett jokes, “We have an ex-girlfriend [song] and a wife [song] – Joe Nichols is living off of Dallas’ love life and Ben and I are also living and dying by Dallas’ love life. But, the now married Dallas shares, “I’m done, so we’ve got to start gettin’ some new ideas.”

Check out what else Joe Nichols has to say about “Gimmie That Girl” as he gives us a peek into the sound of the song:

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Image courtesy of Show Dog - Universal

Nikita Palmer for Citadel Digital © 2010

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