Scotty McCreery has just released a new song titled " Bottle Rockets ," and it's poised to become one of the biggest country songs of the summer of 2025.

But while the song is a carefree summertime jam, the writing process involved a raging case of the flu, six inches of snow and a "bear attack" near-miss, according to one of the songwriters.

The "Bottle Rockets" lyrics borrow the chorus from Hootie & the Blowfish's smash debut single from 1994, "Hold My Hand," but as famed Nashville songwriter Monty Criswell tells Taste of Country, nobody involved had any idea it would turn out that way when they got together to work on the song.

"We went to a writer retreat in January of this year up in North Carolina," Criswell recalls. "Scotty's got a place up there. Back several years ago, [prod

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