Story Behind the Song: Brett Eldredge, ‘Good Day’
Brett Eldredge wants to meet the moment with his single "Good Day." While the country star wrote the song with Ian Fitchuk and Daniel Tashian -- who also co-produced Eldredge's 2020 album Sunday Drive -- prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, it's morphed from a message he needed to hear to one he feels we all need to hear during the era of masking, social distancing and heightened stress.
Eldredge, Fitchuk and Tashian were writing together for the first time when they penned "Sunday Drive," in Tashian's garage studio, and laid down its demo. The experience, the singer admits, pushed him out of his comfort zone -- but, in that way, was exactly what he was looking for.
Below, Eldredge shares the story behind "Sunday Drive" in his own words.
When I wrote this song, it was around a couple years ago -- I guess, a year and a half ago -- and I was in a place in my life where I was feeling very -- I was getting self-aware of the moments where I'd get very negative about things, even when I woke up in the morning, and I think, you know, the decision to wake up and not focus on the negative things and say "I'm gonna have a good day regardless of what's thrown at me" was a big message for myself to learn, 'cause I can find a lot of things to be negative about ...
I think [I needed to teach myself to be] able to try to find some optimism and say, "You know what, I'm gonna have a good day and spread that optimism around. I'm gonna wake up, I'm gonna have a good day, even if there's a lot of negative things; I'm gonna put my best self forward, I'm gonna be there for other people, I'm gonna be there for myself, and I'm gonna have a good day and make that decision when I wake up." And I think it's a song that kind of spreads that message, and it's really important in a time [like] right now ... I just hope that it spreads a good message out there ...
Daniel and Ian are very unique creators and individuals, which I love ... When I walked in the room to write with them, I knew those guys a little bit, but I'd never gotten to write with them ... Actually, it was our first day to ever write, and I was so excited, but I didn't know what it was gonna be like, and it was just such an incredible experience.
And it was out of my comfort zone; it was a totally different style of writing than I was used to, in a way. Daniel was sitting on the floor, cutting out cardboard paper and storyboarding the lyrics we were writing in very strange-looking ways, but it made me think in different ways, and then Ian would hop on one instrument to another, and Daniel would hop on one instrument to another, and I started to feel this kind of new wavelength that I was writing on.
And with this song, it was where I was going through my life ... I needed to find that good-feeling song that is more than just a good-feeling song, though -- it's an intention ...
I think we started getting these lyrics, and then we recorded it in [Daniel's] garage studio, called Royal Plum, and when I got that demo back of literally just me singing raw on the mic in the garage with them playing down live, I discovered, okay, this is the voice -- this is the me -- that I've been searching for; it's the rawness and the organic-ness that I've really been trying to find ...
We had an instant connection, and I kept showing up, even if I was still out of my comfort zone for a while. That's exactly where I want to be in life.
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