In a heartwarming new video, Tenille Townes has shared the story of how she was inspired to write Kenny Chesney's new song, ‘Goldfish’, after watching an episode of Ted Lasso.

Townes penned Chesney's latest single - which features on his new album, Silver Sands Marina - with Gordie Sampson and Tia Sillers, with the playful song rattling through an array of animals before landing on the goldfish as the ideal creature to be. The reason? They have a famously short memory, which means our heartbroken protagonist in the song would finally be able to forget the pain of his break-up.

In a new video, Townes recalls how the idea for the track stemmed from an episode of Apple TV's Ted Lasso, in which Ted - played by Jason Sudeikis - tells his player that the key to being happy is to move on from your mistakes as quickly as possible.

In the iconic clip from Season 1, Ted asks Sam, “You know what the happiest animal on earth is? The goldfish. You know why?...Got a 10 second memory. Be a goldfish, Sam”.

Townes reflects, “I love Ted Lasso. This guy just picks your spirit up right when you need it the most. And I'm watching this, and honestly, at the time, I was going through one hell of a heartache. I was like, it'd be really fun if this goldfish rule applied to that”.

She goes on, “I could just count down from 10 and then be over it, it would be amazing. So I thought that'd make a funny idea for a song. I had a write coming up with my friends Gordie Sampson and Tia Sillers. They've written songs like ‘I Hope You Dance’ and ‘Jesus, Take the Wheel’, so I wasn't nervous at all or anything. And I thought we were gonna write this, you know, hard-hitting ballad, and we're throwing out ideas, and nothing was sticking. And I'm scrolling through my phone to the bottom of my list of ideas, and I'm like, ‘Am I really about to throw out the fact that I want to write a song about a goldfish right now?’”

The multiple JUNO Award winner continues, “But I did, and then we just had the best day. It was like the joy of music just filled the room. We laughed. We had so much fun with each other, and I was just in quite a dark space. And this day was such a gift to me, just like feeling the lightness of that. And I walked away from that session thinking nothing was going to happen with this funny little ‘Animal Kingdom’ song. But the next day, Tia, my co-writer, got dared to play a brand new song at a show at the Listening Room [Café], and she picked ‘Goldfish’.

“And one of our other friends on the round heard the song, and was meeting with Kenny Chesney's producer the next morning, and telling him, ‘Hey, you should hear the song, and you should send it to Kenny’. And I am so grateful she said that, and that he decided to send it, because eight days later, Kenny Chesney took the song into the studio. That does not happen. I've been writing songs in Nashville for like for 14 years, and this is the first time anything like this has ever occurred.

“So that was a crazy little miracle. And then my phone rings. Okay, and 14-year-old me, who was writing songs in my room, dreaming of a day when somebody like Kenny Chesney would record one of my songs, would have lost her mind at this phone call. But Kenny called me, and he was just like, ‘I love this song and I'd love to say hey. Come by the studio and hear it’. He was so kind. The fact that he took the time to do this still just makes me want to cry. It was so nice.

“I loved getting to say hello and we walk in, we're chatting for a bit and he was like, ‘So did you write this about a heartache you've been through recently?’ And I was like, ‘Yep’. And then he pressed play on the song and the song finished and he goes, ‘Well, are you over him yet?’ And I was like, ‘Yes, Kenny, trust me, I am’.

“Anyways, everything about this whole song felt like a whisper that was saying, ‘Keep going’, literally, right when I needed it the most. So, if you're out there looking for that whisper too, I'm here to say it happens, and I hope that your goldfish moment is just right around the corner. So, thank you guys for listening to the song.

The ‘Lemonade Stand’ singer-songwriter concludes, “Thank you to Gordie and Tia for writing this with me. Thank you to Marla and to Robert for helping get this to Kenny. Shout out to Ted Lasso for the inspiration. And my goodness, thank you Kenny Chesney for making my songwriter jones literally come true. This is so insanely cool”.

It's a touching tale that captures the spirit behind so much of Chesney's catalogue, where he uses an overtly sad or despondent situation, and somehow flips it into a cause for celebration and a reason to find a little joy and - crucially - a little hope.

Which makes it feel like destiny that Townes’ idea for ‘Goldfish’, which originated from a TV show that emanates such joy and hope, somehow found its way into Chesney's lap. It's one of our favourite new releases, and ensures the anticipation remains sky high ahead of Chesney's eagerly anticipated new album, Silver Sands Marina.