Back in the day, when Colden Rainy Swindell (his actual birth name) was on the road with Luke Bryan, selling merch, he dreamed of moving to Nashville to write songs and perform. He eventually got there and started writing for some big name stars. Discover 6 amazing songs Cole Swindell wrote for other artists, here!

With 9 # one singles of his own and 4 gold and platinum albums, Swindell has etched a spot for himself in his lane of art. Being on the road with Luke in the early days gave him an opportunity to hone his craft as a songwriter. That led to a job in Nashville at a music publishing house where he churned out songs for artists.

Cole told BMI “I had three years of nothing but writing songs every single day, ever since I was affiliated with BMI. I remember my first meeting; BMI set me up with some co-writes, and that’s all I did for three years, just praying that people like Luke Bryan and Jason Aldean and Blake Shelton would record my songs.” BMI stands for Broadcast Music, Inc. It’s an organization that represents songwriters, composers and producers.

It’s All About The Hits: Hit Songs Cole Swindell Wrote For Other Artists

Cole Swindell’s writing resume is impressive. He’s co-penned some big ones. And he’s been a part of hits for some major country stars.

You will certainly recognize the names of the smash hits on this list. Cole’s had a part in helping stars like Luke Bryan, Florida Georgia Line and Thomas Rhett score some chart-toppers. Since moving to Nashville in 2007, the CMA Award winner has cumulated quite a collection of compositions.

The “Single Saturday Night” singer turned the hit-writing into an impressive catalog of his own music. From his first #1 on radio, “Chillin’ It,” to the multi-award winning, multi-platinum, multi-week #1 “She Had Me at Heads Carolina.” He does sometimes defer to other songwriters for material. In fact, his 2023 hit “Drinkaby” was written by Hardy, Jon Pardi, Jordan Schmidt and Hunter Phelps.

Take a look below and uncover more than a handful of outstanding hit songs Cole Swindell wrote for other country stars. Which one do you think he should have kept and recorded?

• 1. Get Me Some Of That

  Singer: Thomas Rhett

  Year: 2014

  “Get Me Some of That” became Thomas Rhett’s 2nd #1. Written by Cole Swindell, Thomas Rhett, Rhett Akins and Michael Carter, the playful hit went 2x platinum. It was also mentioned as a diss in Maddie and Tae’s “Girl in a Country Song.” 

• 2. Outta My Head

  Singer: Craig Campbell

  Year: 2012

  Campbell scored one of his biggest hits with this Cole Swindell, Michael Carter, Brandon Kinney song. It went top 15 and help establish Craig as a hitmaking artist in Nashville. 

• 3. Roller Coaster

  Singer: Luke Bryan

  Year: 2014

  Another Cole Swindell, Michael Carter writing collab led Luke Bryan to the top of the charts in 2014. The summer-vibey smash is about a man who meets a woman in Panama City, while on vacation near an amusement park. Cole shared the story with Billboard, “Going down there, you always met a girl — like a day before you had to leave, you got up enough courage to finally talk to her, and then she’s got to leave the next day.” Her leaving has you “twisted like that old beach roller coaster.” 

• 4. Summer Forever

  Singer: Billy Currington

  Year: 2015

  Summer Forever is the title track from Currington’s #1 album released in June of 2015. Cole Swindell co-wrote this one with Jaren Johnston of the Cadillac Three, alongside Jesse Frasure and Florida Georgia Line’s Tyler Hubbard and Brian Kelley. The album produced big hits like “Do I Make You Wanna,” “It Don’t Hurt Like It Used To,” and “Don’t It.” Although the single “Summer Forever” wasn’t a hit it’s still a live show favorite and a go-to summer jam.

• 5. This is How We Roll

  Singers: Florida Georgia Line and Luke Bryan

  Year: 2014

  By the summer of 2014 “This Is How We Roll” was dominating radio and was unofficially the song of the summer. Tyler Hubbard and Brian Kelley of FGL co-wrote this one with Cole Swindell, when they were all on tour with Luke Bryan. Luke jumped in on the bus writing session when the song was about half done, and he added some lines and ideas. So the 4 of them had a hand in this #1. Cole explained to CBS,”The reason we wrote that song was because Luke, the night before, he did a little thing in his show where he was playing ‘Muckalee Creek’ and he was saying, being in the country you can shoot bullets at the moon and no one’s going to bother you. Brian Kelley said, ‘Hey, we gotta write something. Shooting bullets at the moon, I love that idea.’ And we wrote ‘This Is How We Roll’ around it.”

• 6. Water Tower Town

  Singer: Scotty McCreery

  Year: 2012

  “Water Tower Town” was Cole Swindell’s first big writing credit. And to think it went to the American Idol winner from the year before! That’s a big deal. Swindell co-wrote this one with writers Tammi Kidd and Lynn Hutton. Scotty related to this song because, as he told SongFacts, “It reminds me of Garner, which has a big water tower right across from the baseball fields where I grew up playing ball. It has a lot of elements in there that remind me of Garner. The first lyric in the chorus is, ‘Friday night football is king,’ and that is true in Garner. Everybody stops what they’re doing in Garner to go to the game. The song says, ‘Sweet tea goes good with anything,’ and that is all we drink back home. All of the lyrics really relate to my hometown.”  The top 38 hit was featured on Scotty’s debut album, Clear As Day. 

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