The day of his Uncle Terry’s wake in June of 2020, Michael Ray had a scheduled co-writing session with Hardy and David Garcia. Rather than cancel, the country singer came armed with an idea based on something a friend had said the night before — and left with a new song, “Picture.”
Ray found the idea for “Picture” in a comment made by a friend named Ryan. Below, the singer shares the story behind the song, in his own words.
Obviously we weren’t planning that to happen, so I had a whole week of work and writes and all that stuff planned, and moved everything except this one write I had to be at on the day of his viewing.
I flew down to Florida, and the night before, the family was getting together, going through photos. My buddy Ryan, he said something along the lines of, “Isn’t it crazy to think, one day we’ll just be pictures to people?”
I wrote it down, put it in my pocket. I kept the write, thank God, and called Hardy and David Garcia and said, “Hey, guys, I think I’ve got this idea, and I know exactly how I wanna go with it.”
It mentions my sister; it talks about my mom; it talks about my other uncle and his buddy in the second verse — so it’s probably the most personal song I’ve ever written.
50 Essential ’90s Country Songs: