Story Behind the Song: Brandon Ratcliff, ‘Rules of Breaking Up’

Up-and-comer Brandon Ratcliff's debut track, "Rules of Breaking Up," came about after the title phrase got tossed out in a writing session. Immediately, Ratcliff and his fellow writers dropped everything and turned their attention to the song.

An upbeat and relatable breakup anthem with a twist, "Rules of Breaking Up" helped land Ratcliff a slot on Kelsea Ballerini's 2019 Miss Me More Tour alongside Brett Young. Read on to learn the story behind the song, in Ratcliff's own words.

I remember when we were writing that song, we were actually writing another song, and we stumbled across the title, "Rules of Breaking Up," and a bridge. And we all just kinda stopped and were like, "Whoa. What are the rules of breaking up?" And the other song we were writing just completely went out the window, and everybody was just completely focused on that title.

I remember thinking to myself, "I know what they are, but I've never heard anybody say that before, 'the rules of breaking up.'" What do you do, what do you not do, when you get out of a relationship? We all kinda know what they are; they're pretty universal: You're not supposed to call them. You're definitely not supposed to go over there and see them. You gotta give them space. All those things.

[The song] was really supposed to be about that one relationship that makes you not want to follow any of those rules, where you're like, "I know I'm not supposed to call you, but really, you just mean that much to me that I don't care. I gotta call you."