In April of 2018, country duo Sugarland released "Babe" as a single off of their album Bigger. While the song is one of a batch of tracks that make up the first new music the duo has released since going on hiatus in 2012, "Babe" is also unique in that it's the only song on Bigger that Sugarland, comprised of Jennifer Nettles and Kristian Bush, didn't write. 

What makes the song extra special, however, is who did write it: "Babe" was written by Taylor Swift, who also contributed vocals to the final cut of the track, and Pat Monahan of Train. Read on to learn more about how Sugarland came to collaborate with Swift on "Babe," and why it was so important to Nettles and Bush to do the song justice, in Nettles' own words.

We got a fantastic phone call a few months ago. We had been writing the record and, long story short, a young lady by the name of Taylor Swift reached out. You might have heard of her -- she's done a number of things. Anyway, she reached out and was excited we were getting back together, and she said that she had a song, and she was wondering if we would be interested in singing it.

The fun part of this is that we started out together with Taylor, around the same time, except she was 15, and we were ... not 15. Even at that time, we had a little unsigned EP that we had done; she still has a copy of that, which we autographed for her. So, we've been mutual fans and admirers of each other for a long time, and when she found out we were getting back together, she was excited and wanted to know if we'd be interested in singing this song. We said yes, of course.

We really wanted to do it justice and wanted to record something she loved, so thankfully she loved it when she heard how we'd done it, and decided she wanted to be a part of it.

More From 92.5 The Ranch