Story Behind the Song: 'She's Somebody's Daughter' by Drew Baldridge

For this week's Story Behind the Song, Nashville Songwriters Association International Executive Director Bart Herbison sat down with singer/songwriter Drew Baldridge to talk not so much about how the song "She's Somebody's Daughter" was written, but how it got to No. 1.

Baldridge defied all the odds stacked against him after losing his label deal, his publisher, booking agent and manager. He told Herbison he wondered what he was going to do to make a living and be able to buy a ring for the girl he wanted to marry.

So he did what any good songwriter would do: he kept writing songs.

"All I know is I have a song in my heart and I want to talk about it," Baldridge said. "We have this song called 'She's Somebody's Daughter' that came out in 2019 on my old label, who didn't do anything with it because the label closed three months after we put it out on Spotify."

A new bride, a new version and 10 million views on TikTok

Just before Baldridge got married, he decided to make a special wedding version just so his new bride could dance to it with her father.

"I sit side stage and I'm crying like a baby watching them dance," he said. "It was just such a special moment for us because I wrote it after meeting her dad, you know, and want to treat her right."

While on their honeymoon, Baldridge posts on TikTok that if the song gets 5,000 likes he would release it the following Friday. The song was already slated to release, but he was hoping for a reaction.

The post didn't get 5,000 views. Instead, in less than 24 hours it got nearly 10 million views.

"Me and my wife are freaking out. We gained 100,000 followers overnight."

Backstory: Drew Baldridge's 'She's Somebody's Daughter' showcases country's fan-led indie influence

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Grassroots effort leads to unprecedented success

He thought labels were going to call and he'd be back on a team. But that didn't happen. Instead, Baldridge, who always wanted a radio hit, started calling radio stations himself. He realized he needed a team, so he hired a few "great names" to help him. He would pay them with the money he was getting from streaming.

"I remember we had 18 radio stations our first week. People who believed in me from my old record and they came out of the box and played the song a couple of times," he said. "And I was like, 'man, I have 140 more to go.'"

Months went by with little traction. So Baldridge shifted his ask a bit at radio. He stopped asking stations to play it, but rather to "test" it with listeners.

"If it tests bad, they're not going to play it anyways," he said. "If it tests good, they might spin it."

A station in Dallas tested it and it came back one of the top two songs in their market.

"They said this had never happened before and they were like 'we are immediately going to have to start playing this."

That snowballed into other stations playing it. The ones that didn't jump on board immediately got a visit from Baldridge himself who would show up and ask why a station wasn't playing it.

Herbison would add, "There's more more old school story I've heard."

One week after this conversation was recorded, the song "She's Somebody's Daughter" went to No. 1. Baldridge becomes the first self-funded artist ever to top the Mediabase Country chart.

About the series

In partnership with Nashville Songwriters Association International, the "Story Behind the Song" video interview series features Nashville-connected songwriters discussing one of their compositions. For full video interviews with all our subjects, visit www.tennessean.com/music.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Drew Baldridge tells how he defied all the odds to get a No. 1 song with no label deal