In early 2016, hours before he was set to appear as a mentor on American Idol, Scotty McCreery got terrible news: he had been dropped from his record label.
When the initial shock wore off, McCreery panicked a little, knowing he had written some of his best songs ever while signed, and that he’d have to fight for ownership of them. His lawyer spent the better part of 2016 trying to come to a deal with Universal Music Group Nashville so he could keep “Five More Minutes” and “In Between.”
“I knew it was make or break for [my career],” McCreery tells the Tennessean. “I had just lost a major record deal. I hadn’t had music out since 2013. This had to work, and if I was going to bet my career on a song, it was going to be ‘Five More Minutes.'”