Randy Houser, ‘Runnin’ Outta Moonlight’ — Story Behind the Song

Veteran music journalist Jake Brown spoke to a wide variety of the top songwriters in Nashville for his new book, ‘Nashville Songwriter: The Inside Stories Behind Country Music’s Greatest Hits.’

Brown got the scoop from Craig Wiseman, Bob DiPiero, Bill Anderson, Tom Shapiro, Kelley Lovelace, Rivers Rutherford, Tom T. Hall, Chris Dubois, Dallas Davidson, David Lee Murphy, Brett James, Ashley Gorley and Neil Thrasher, among others, taking a look at the writing process behind some of the most popular songs in classic and contemporary country. The book is available here.

In this exclusive video, Gorley talks about writing Randy Houser's hit 'Runnin' Outta Moonlight.' It was the second single from Houser's third studio album, the platinum-selling 'How Country Feels.' Davidson and Lovelace also helped pen the tune.

"'Runnin' Outta Moonlight' came together, I think, a couple years ago," says Gorley. "[Davidson, Lovelace and I] have kind of a semi-regular thing ... We make sure and hang out every now and then and try to crank one out."

When they sat down at one of their jam sessions, Gorley recalls that Lovelace got things started.

"Kelley is great at ideas; he had brainstormed some ideas. He had a titled called 'Wastin' Moonlight,' actually, which we all kinda liked ... I was on the piano I think, Dallas was kind of strumming along ... As it was kind of going down, we just started playing with different melodic flows, different phrasings, different ideas about going to pick up the girl and the fact you want the night to last all night long."

Before long, they were piecing things together, and instead of singing "wastin' moonlight," they realized the more staccato beat of "runnin' out of moonlight" sounded better.

"A lot of those things are magical happy accidents," Gorley says with a laugh. "The best line wins."

In addition to 'Runnin' Outta Moonlight,' Houser scored No. 1 hits with 'Goodnight Kiss' and 'How Country Feels' from the same album.

'Runnin' Outta Moonlight' was Gorley's 10th No. 1 hit, his first being Carrie Underwood's 2006 song 'Don't Forget to Remember Me.' He's got 16 total No. 1s to his name and was recently named NSAI Songwriter of the Year.