“Little Big Town’s Shocking Revelation About the Challenge of Recording Their Taylor Swift Song you won’t believe what they have to say

Little Big Town’s “Better Man,” written solely by their longtime friend Taylor Swift, may have quickly become a hit for the country crooners, but it didn’t necessarily come easily. Karen Fairchild, one-quarter of the quartet that also includes Jimi Westbrook, Kimberly Schlapman and Phillip Sweet, admitted in a new interview with People ahead of the release of their upcoming Greatest Hits compilation-which, naturally, features the 2016 hit from The Breaker album-that molding the song from a Taylor Swift track to a Little Big Town song was actually “quite a challenge.”

While it may have “seem[ed] like a slam dunk” to be on the receiving end of a composition from the beloved artist, the act of “reinterpreting” it to “make it [their] own… turned out to be quite a challenge because you just have her in your head, and she’s such a brilliant writer and performer.” “Could we pull it off and make it feel like it was ours?” they all wondered at the time. While it “took [them] a little bit,” they ultimately found their version. “We have such fond memories of bringing her to the studio to let her hear when it was done,” she added, recalling the look on Swift’s face when she heard the final product for the first time. “She was like, ‘I love it. I love it.’ I love hearing her sing it now. We interpret it different ways, but a great song is a great song.”

The single was originally planned for Swift’s fourth studio album, Red, which was released in 2012, but it didn’t make the final cut. Years later, she emailed Sweet while the band was on the road with Luke Bryan, floating it past him with no pressure. Sweet recalled her saying something along the lines of, “Hey, I have this song. I’ve had it for a little while. I hear your harmonies on it. If you like it, great. If not, no big deal,” when she sent the demo, which he played for everyone the next day. The whole lot of them were “amazed that [Swift] would send [them] the song,” but, all in all, it was “a beautiful match” for the group.