Just before the weekend hit, singer Russell Dickerson joined Audacy hosts Rob + Holly for the Friday Night Takeover, giving us some insight into his emotional single, "God Gave Me A Girl,"
LISTEN NOW: Russell Dickerson joins Rob + Holly for the Friday Night Takeover
Russell is back on the road with his Big Wheels & Backroads tour after some well-deserved “down-time” following the birth of his second son, Radford, on October 1. "Straight out of a movie," RD says, as he was dropped off at the hospital while on tour to take part in his arrival, explaining how while in Kansas City, his wife Kailey had called his tour manager to let him know contractions had begun. After doubting her, he rushed to have the bus driver drop him off right outside the hospital.
This led Rob and Holly to wonder about the inspiration behind his hit single "God Gave Me A Girl" which, if you've been counting is, about the woman who birthed their two beautiful boys.
"I think the original title was like, 'God Gave Me A Hometown,' or something like that," Dickerson explains. But after realizing that Carrie Underwood has a similarly titled song, he went back to the drawing board. "I was like, 'What about 'God Gave Me A Girl,'' you know? I got some love songs, we can just keep down this love song road... but what does that look like for me?"
Russell says he thought back to a time when he and Kailey had broken up, when he had come to a realization that if he truly wanted the "best life ever," then he would have to reconnect with her. It was time to "quit being an idiot," he says. "God called me an idiot... so that's what I pulled from that time," he continues. "Gave it hell on Friday nights, all about the single life... blah, blah, blah. That was that moment in time, and then it was just like, 'What am I doing? God gave me this girl...' So, that's kind of the story."
Getting her back, Russell admits, was "kind of awesome, and so cheesy. It was Thanksgiving Day and I was at my family's house and she was obviously with her family. I was like, 'We should be together, we should be with each other's families.' I called her up and was like, 'Hey, what up gurl? I just wanna tell you that I'm thankful for you, on Thanksgiving Day...'"
"That was the first steps," he says. "It wasn't immediate but she was like, 'If we're gonna do this, it's you and me, all in, I'm not messing around.' And I was like, 'OK I got you... I'm in.'"
Hear more from RD by checking out his entire Friday Night Takeover conversation with Rob + Holly above.