Story Behind the Song: Joe Nichols, ‘The Shape I’m In’
Count Joe Nichols' "The Shape I'm In" among the bevy of songs penned by the Peach Pickers, the Georgia-born songwriting trio of Rhett Akins, Dallas Davidson and Ben Hayslip. The song was the third single from Nichols' Old Things New album, and ws released in July of 2010.
"The Shape I'm In" became a Top 20 hit for Nichols, peaking at No. 17 on the country radio charts. Below, Davidson and Hayslip recount the story behind the song to The Boot, in their own words.
Ben Hayslip: I had the title my whole life. For years, I've always ask my granddad how he was doing, and he'd say, "I'm okay for the shape I'm in ..." He was always in good shape, but he would always say that.
I had that idea in my notebook for 8-10 years. For whatever reason, it never hit me in a way to write it in a song.
Dallas was playing a cool groove ... another one of our two-chord specials. We threw a couple lines out, and that title at that time struck me.
I said, "This is the day to write this song!" Dallas picked up the guitar, Rhett played lead, and somebody threw the ideas out.
Dallas Davidson: The morning we wrote this song, I was hungover with a pounding head in my office. Rhett and Ben came over to write. I had picked up a napkin off the desk that had a girl's number on it. That's where the line about [a] number off the napkin and [a] pounding head came from.
From there, we went off to the races. I think we just dialed into that one real quickly.
This story was originally written by Alanna Conaway, and revised by Angela Stefano.