Ronnie Dunn, ‘Let the Cowboy Rock’ – Lyrics Uncovered

The lyrics to Ronnie Dunn's next single, 'Let the Cowboy Rock,' show the rock side of the now solo artist, who spent the past 20 years of his career as one half of duo Brooks and Dunn. The tune was penned by Dunn, along with hit songwriter Dallas Davidson of the Peach Pickers.

"It's funny how me and Ronnie were introduced," Davidson tells Taste of Country with a smile. "I'm pretty good about my emails, but I'm far less than great! I was checking my emails one day, and I went to my junk mail. I see 'Ronnie Dunn.' I was like, 'Oh my God,' because I'm a huge Ronnie Dunn and Brooks and Dunn fan. I clicked on it, and it was Ronnie Dunn. He had sent it two months before, wanting to write. He left his cell phone number, so I immediately called him and said, 'Man, I am so sorry ... I just got your email!' We started texting back and forth. He texted me the title 'Let the Cowboy Rock,' and I texted him back, 'Let the good times roll.' Then it was like, all right, we're writing a song!"

"We got together soon after," Davidson, BMI's 2011 Songwriter of the Year, continues. "I went to his barn, and I was nervous as hell! We were sitting there playing guitar a little bit. He started singing, and I was going 'God! This is Ronnie Dunn!' He was right across the coffee table from me. It was pretty cool to hear your hero sing a song that you're writing with him! I write with a lot of people, but that one was pretty bad a---. Once I kind of shook the cobwebs off and the nervousness left, we got going [with] writing that thing. We went straight for a bar room, thumpin' ZZ Top sound. He's a big Billy Gibbons fan and ZZ Top fan. You definitely hear that in there."

"Let the cowboy rock, let the good times roll / This is where the hurt stops or where the whiskey flows / Let him drink every drop, go, go, go ’til he drops / Let the cowboy rock," they wrote in the lyrics of the chorus.

"It's pretty simple," Davidson says of the concept of the song's lyrics. "He got his heart broke and he's ready to party. It's kind of got the edge -- a cowboy rockin' is the whole edginess of the song."

"You think he’s still a little green / Y’all, he’s fresh off the farm / Some pretty little thing put a whooping on his heart / He’s walking to the left, leaning to the right / Talking to himself, putting up a fight," they wrote in the song.

"I think it will do well," Davidson says. "Ronnie sings the [hell] out of it. It's going to be a good one. Hopefully he'll have a big ol' No. 1 with it. I want this one to work more than anything of mine that has come out lately because I have double investment in it. I produced the song with Ronnie. This will be my first single that I actually produced on anybody. As a songwriter, we produce our demos and then the producers take it and they do a great job when they go produce it. We don't get any credit ever for the initial production. I'm very excited that I will have a song on Ronnie Dunn's album -- of all people -- and I will have producer's credit on it!"

Listen to Ronnie Dunn's 'Let the Cowboy Rock'