Little Big Town hit the airwaves this week with “Day Drinking,” the first single from their forthcoming album, due out later this year. When you listen to the song, you’ll hear whistling in the chorus – that rhythmic whistling happened by accident when they sat down to write the song.

“I remember that we had come from the road, because I remember being very hoarse, like really road weary voice-wise,” says Little Big Town’s Karen Fairchild. “So, when we were messing with melodies on the chorus, I started singing something but I couldn’t hit it, so I whistled it.”

“It was out of necessity,” she adds. “I was whistling because I couldn’t sing what I really wanted to sing. And I was actually emulating what the mando[lin] was doing. It was just this hodgepodge of like, ‘Oh, that should be the chorus and the whistle’s cool.’”

They’re set to perform “Day Drinking” on Wednesday night’s CMT Music Awards, airing live from Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena beginning at 8pm ET.

The band is currently running around Nashville taping segments for their stint as hosts of the CMA Music Festival. If you’re not in town, you can catch all of the action when ABC airs the TV special, Country’s Night to Rock August 5th.

LBT (Day Drinking) OC: …something’s wrong. :44
KAREN: “I remember that we had come from the road, because I remember being very hoarse, like really road weary voice-wise. So, when we were messing with melodies on the chorus, I started singing something but I couldn’t hit it, so I whistled it.” PHILLIP: “That’s right.” KAREN: “Remember?” JIMI: “Yeah, and I was like, ‘That’s cool.’ I was like, ‘Whistle. Maybe we should whistle.’” So, there’s kind of a little whistle hook in there.” KAREN: “But it was out of necessity. I was whistling because I couldn’t sing what I really wanted to sing. And I was actually emulating what the mando[lin] was doing. It was just this hodgepodge of like, ‘Oh, that should be the chorus and the whistle’s cool.’ When you’re writing a song about day drinking, I mean seriously, [Jimi laughs] if you’re not having a good time while you’re writing, then something’s wrong.”