This week on Backstage Country, Chris Young isn’t just playing his songs; he’s telling the stories that made them hits. When the man behind songs like “Til The Last One Dies”, “Jesus, Momma, Country Radio,” and “I Hope It’s Okay” starts talking about what really inspired those lyrics, you’ll want to listen.
Co-hosting with Elaina Smith, Young will share his songwriting process and discuss where he draws his inspiration.
Chris Young Hits
“Til The Last One Dies”
Chris Young - Til The Last One Dies
Smith described the track “Til The Last One Dies” as another way of saying “I’ll love you forever.” The Tennessee-born singer clarified he did not write the track and shared how the song became included in the album: “I do like writing my songs, but sometimes you just find one. You're like, ‘Dang it, I should have thought of that first!’ This is a lot of friends of mine getting together, and they wrote this song called ‘Till the Last One Dies.’ That's basically saying, the hook is ‘11 real ones, one fake one.’ I love you until the last one dies about giving somebody roses. I find that incredibly perfect. So, I had to cut it.”
He added that upon receiving the song, he knew right away, “It got sent to me and I was, ‘This song is first dance at a wedding material. I fell in love with the song, but I was very lucky to be able to cut this and to have it on my record, and I knew this was going to be the first single.”
“Jesus, Momma, Country Radio”
Chris Young - Jesus, Momma, Country Radio
Young shared that he included a song about his father on his latest album, I Didn’t Come Here to Leave, something that made his mom jealous (sort of). He chuckled, “My mom was like, ‘Do I get a song?’ And I was like, ‘I've got to include my mom. If I put mom, country radio, and Jesus all in the same song, hopefully she'll forgive me for writing the song about my dad first.’ But no, that's not why we did this.”
He clarified, “It's sort of an encapsulation of who I am. I feel like I got a lot of freedom with this new record deal with Black River Entertainment, and everybody at the label has been so amazing and taking nothing away from anything else that I've ever done. I've always sort of been loved by my labels, whether it was RCA at Sony for 19 years, almost, or now at my new home.”
He continued, “We've got a lot of fun songs on the record. There's a lot of party songs, there's love songs. I wrote a couple things that specifically, you know, pertain to me as far as a human and my family and my relationship with my mom and my dad and just how much I love them and what they've gone through because you know that's the backbone of where you come from.”
“I Hope It’s Okay”
Smith admitted that the chorus to “I Hope It’s Okay” broke her heart. Young shared that he wrote the song with a couple of his friends: “One in particular, Austin Machado, I'm actually the godfather to his kid. So him and his wife had the idea for us to try and write this song because her dad had passed away before they got married. I think this is a beautiful sentiment, not the inverse, but just a different way to look at it. The process of marrying someone ‘Til The Last One Dies’ is the love song that you dance to. ‘I Hope It's Okay’ is the song that some people go through, and you'll understand when you hear it.”
Tune in to Backstage Country to hear the real stories, the laughs, and the behind-the-scenes moments that made Young’s latest album special. Preorder I Didn’t Come Here to Leave here.
