Celebrities are accustomed to autographing the occasional unusual item for a fan, and Jake Owen tells us he’s been getting plenty of requests lately from guys asking him to sign…spit cans! Now, when you consider that Jake’s smash single, “Eight Second Ride,” makes reference to having a spit cup for chewing tobacco inside a truck, well, the requests start to make sense. And as far as including a lyric about a spit cup, Jake wrote the song years ago and traces the story back to his brother — and his brother’s buddies — who basically bugged him until he wrote a song they wanted to hear. (AUDIO INFO BELOW)

• Look for “Eight Second Ride,” as well as the blockbuster “Don’t Think I Can’t Love You,” both on Jake’s latest album, Easy Does It.  
• And watch for Jake as he steps in as celebrity guest host for this week’s CMT Top 20 Countdown! Catch the episode premiere this Friday, January 8th, at 11am, ET, on CMT, with re-airings Saturday (11am, ET) and Sunday (11:30am, ET).

  Jake Owen says that razzing from his brother and friends inspired him to write “Eight Second Ride.” (:52)
“I wrote it because my brother used to get mad at me. He and all his buddies, they’re like, ‘Man, all you do is write songs for girls, man. Your girlfriend — you’re always writin’ her tunes. Why don’t you write us a song that we can play in our trucks and have a good time with and crank it up loud?’ So it was like, ‘All right.’ So I did. And I relate to that song very much. My brother, back in the day and still does, has always spit tobacco, and I remember every time I’d get in his truck, he’d always have a spit cup sittin’ there on his little console. And he’d always say, ‘Hey, man, watch out, man. I been spittin’ in that cup,’ and I’d always have to look out for it. So I put that line in the song about ‘climb on up, but honey, watch the cup where I’m spittin’ my dip inside.’ (laughs) And it’s funny, man, ’cause every girl relates to that, ’cause they, if, you know, they’re a good ol’ country girl, they’ve dated a guy that’s done that before. And then, every guy comes up to me at shows now makin’ me sign their spit can, you know, or dip can, and it’s pretty funny.”