It’s obvious, right? Jelly Roll is the hottest artist in country music and he’s on Dustin Lynch‘s record label — why wouldn’t he make the call to get him on “Chevrolet“?

That’s not really why Lynch wanted his help, however. Talking to Taste of Country Nights, he admits the duet is rooted in ironing out a response to a still very new trend in country music.

• “Chevrolet” is Lynch’s ninth No. 1 hit on the Billboard Country Airplay Chart. It’s Jelly Roll’s fifth.
• Find it on the Killed a Cowboy album, released last fall.
• The melody is borrowed from “Drift Away,” a Mentor Williams-penned song first made popular by Dobie Gray.

Dustin Lynch (Feat. Jelly Roll), “Chevrolet” — Story of the Song:

Recently, country stars have taken to interpolating melodies from other genres for new radio singles. Chris Young had success using David Bowie‘s “Rebel, Rebel” melody to drive his No. 1 hit “Young Love & Saturday Nights.” Kane Brown borrowed the drum loop from Phil Collins‘ “In the Air Tonight” for his hit song “I Can Feel It.”

Cole Swindell made “She Had Me at Head’s Carolina” out of Jo Dee Messina‘s “Heads Carolina, Tails California.”

A decade ago, this concept was dead on arrival. Anyone remember Arista Nashville artist Brent Anderson using Pure Prairie League’s “Aimee” to power “Amy’s Song“? Probably not, because it barely cracked airplay charts and Anderson lost his record deal soon after.

“I was scared to death,” Lynch admits, adding that for every “Chevrolet” there are 100 songs that writers have toyed with, but never taken to market. That’s a strange country phenomenon, because until recently, artists weren’t just sampling, but full stop recutting tracks other artists had recorded recently.

Lynch points to Garth Brooks‘ version of a Mark Chesnutt song called “Friends in Low Places” as one very well-known test case. When you drill down on hits from the ’70s and ’80s, you find that about half seem to have been cut by someone else a year or two prior.

“Other genres sample constantly,” he says. “I’m just stoked that we were able to pull this off. It was a song we did that we love — I didn’t really have any intentions to release it as a single, but I’m so glad we did.”

The Female Voice on Dustin Lynch’s “Chevrolet”

The decision to make the song a duet came while Lynch was recording “Chevrolet.” His producer Zach Crowell used to make beats for then-rapper and rocker Jelly Roll. It’d been some time since they talked, but that relationship would prove important.

“(We) were like, ‘This is cool, but what if we softened the risk a little bit if there was another artist on it?'”

“Chevrolet” needed more soul and grit, and who does that better than Jelly Roll in 2023-24?

“He’s like, ‘Let me reach back out to him. I haven’t talked to him in years.’ So he did and they started talking music and doing music together, and then ‘Chevrolet’ came across the desk and we were just kind of in the studio cooking at the same time.”

There is actually one more, less heralded artist on the song, but she’s just as important to the mix as Jelly Roll. Beginning at the end of the second verse, Madeline Merlo adds backing vocals in the same way Sarah Buxton did on his “Ridin’ Roads” from 2019. Team Lynch turns her up just a little louder than most artists.

“You picked up on one of my tricks,” Lynch tells ToC Nights’ Evan Paul, smiling. “Madeline Merlo is … one of the best singers that I’ve ever gotten to be in a room with.”

If you’re curious, Lynch based his song off the Dobie Gray version, but admits he grew up listening to Uncle Kracker‘s hit from 2003. He proved to be an important artist in the journey of this song when last June, he turned up at Lynch’s CMA Fest pool party. When they say it takes a team to make a country hit, this is what they’re talking about.