Songfacts®:

• Cole Swindell married NBA dancer Courtney Little on June 12, 2024, in an outdoor ceremony in Sonoma, California. The two lovebirds first crossed paths at a NASCAR race, but their real spark ignited when Courtney played the country star's love interest in the video for "Some Habits."
  
  "Forever To Me" chronicles their first meeting and his proposal: Swindell popped the question in May 2023 in a soggy Texan field off the same backroad where they shot the "Some Habits" clip.
• Swindell poured his heart out trying to write a love song for their first dance as a married couple, but truth is, he struggled to find the right words. As he tinkered with lyrics here and there, nothing felt quite right.
  
  Inspiration struck on a January night in Houston. Swindell was headlining a private party on the eve of the National College Football Championship, and on a whim, he invited songwriters Greylan James ("Happy Does," "Next Thing You Know") and Rocky Block ("Man Made A Bar," "Cowgirls") to join him for the ride. The trio wrote a couple of songs on the way to Houston, but the real magic happened after the concert.
  
  They stayed up late on the bus, digging deep into Swindell's relationship with his fiancée. When Swindell described Courtney as his "forever to me," this song practically wrote itself.
• The lyrics paint a picture of Courtney's Carolina charm.
  
  She gave 18 summers to Carolina
  Spent a few more wild and free
  
  "Eighteen summers in Carolina" might be a touch off on the exact number, but it's the right state. "That was a little bit poetic license, but it got the point across," Block noted to Billboard. "We were just trying to say she grew up somewhere."
  
  Besides, Swindell has a thing about Carolina. Remember, he sang about the state on his 2022 hit, "She Had Me At Heads Carolina."
• I wish you coulda met my daddy
  Know how happy he would be
  That I gave her a diamond and she gave forever to me
  
  Cole Swindell's father passed away over the 2013 Labor Day weekend when the singer was out on his radio tour. The loss of his dad formed the backbone of his 2015 ballad "You Should Be Here."
• Swindell admitted feeling a ton of pressure to do the song justice, to capture the depth of his love for Courtney. "It was a different kind of feeling - like, 'Man, I can't believe I'm singing this. I can't believe I wrote this song,'" he remembered to Billboard. "I felt a lot of pressure to get it right."
• The recording process became a bit of a journey. Swindell and Greylan James tried different approaches, different musicians, but nothing quite hit the sweet spot. The demo they had crafted just seemed to have a magic that couldn't be replicated.
  
  Finally, Swindell brought in producer Jordan M. Schmidt, who'd helmed three tracks on his 2022 Stereotype album. Schmidt saw the potential in the demo and used a lot of Swindell's raw vocals and even some of James' original drum programming. He brought in drummer Nir Z to add a touch of human feel to the synthetic percussion, and had Jonny Fung completely rework the guitar parts.
• Rocky Block told Billboard it was Greylan James, his co-writer on Cole Swindell's "Left to Get Right," who brought him into the fold for "Forever To Me."
  
  "I didn't know Cole very well," he said. "They were going on a bus run on a Saturday night, and I got the call the day before and it was an obvious yes. So, Greylan really hooked me up with that one and I'm glad Cole decided to record it."