Billy Currington's fans have themselves to thank for the singer's newest single. The artist says that he selected "It Don't Hurt Like It Used To" as the third single from his most recent album, 2015's Summer Forever, because it's been a hit with his followers.

"I kind of keep my ears to the ground after I put an album out, and I'll see signs out in the audience, or you’ll see songs written on social accounts. In the meet and greet lines, people will tell you all the time, when your album comes out, the songs that they love. Especially when it first comes out," Currington tells The Boot. "And the one that kept coming up was "It Don’t Hurt Like It Used To." I heard it quite a bit."

Currington co-wrote the song with Cary Barlowe and Shy Carter -- his only writing credit on Summer Forever -- but he admits that he didn't even consider it for the album, let alone imagine it as a single.

"To be honest, when I wrote that song, I never even turned it in to anyone. I didn’t give it to the label or band or nothing like that, because my song never wins. I just wrote it and put it to the side," Currington recalls. "I got a call from my manager, and he was like, ‘Man, what about that song you just wrote? You need to record that song.’ And at first I was like, ‘No, no.’ But thanks to John Dennis, my manager, he kept going on and on, and finally I was like, ‘I’ll lay it down,’ and like I said, it just kept popping up in conversations."

Currington also wrote his 2010 No. 1 single "That's How Country Boys Roll," but he's remained modest about his songwriting abilities.

"I’ve been writing songs since I was a little kid. It just naturally happens, and it’s nothing I can think about too much," Currington explains. "But when it comes down to putting 10 songs on an album, the 10 best will always win, and it never matters to me who wrote it. I don’t care if I’ve never heard these guys; I don’t even care if they don’t even have a publishing deal. Whoever wrote the best song is the one that’s going to make it on the album, so I end up passing on mine quite a bit."

"It Don't Hurt Like It Used To" is available for download on iTunes.

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