McGraw recently played a secret invite-only show at the Whisky a Go Go to promote his upcoming Standing Room Only tour, and the “I Like It, I Love It” singer opened up about how his wife of 27 years, well, became his wife.
When asked what McGraw and Hill’s special song was, the country musician told Yahoo Entertainment, “Well, there’s one song and it’s really an instrumental, but there’s one.
“I’m probably going to get in trouble for saying this. God, please forgive me, baby,” he continued. “It’s ‘Samba Pa Ti’ by Santana. It’s kind of our song.”
McGraw, 56, said his uncle actually introduced him to the 1970 instrumental hit by the Latin rock band but warned him of the song’s potent effects.
“My uncle told me one time — my uncle Hank, old hippie who lives in Napa Valley — he played it for me one time years ago on the road. He loved that song too. He said, ‘I’m going to tell you something.’ He says, ‘Never make love to a woman with this song on unless you intend to marry her.’ And so I didn’t until I did. And then I did,” McGraw continued.
The country couple, who starred in “1883” together last year, have been married for nearly three decades and share daughters Gracie, 26; Maggie, 24; and Audrey, 21.
“We always like to say we’ve been married 92 years in showbiz language; it’s like dog years,” he joked, adding that now that their daughters are adults, the two empty-nesters are quite enjoying their “honeymoon time again.”
Last year, the two played on-screen married couple James and Margaret Dutton in the “Yellowstone” prequel “1883,” acting together for the first time. “We knew we had a big hill to climb and there were going to be people gunning for us to fail,” McGraw told the Envelope last year. “The only thing for us to do was to kill it every week on set.”
The couple worried they’d struggle to translate their off-screen chemistry to their roles without “Tim and Faith showing up on screen,” Hill told The Times last year. “Tim and I … have done everything together. We’ve raised three daughters, been on tour, in the studio and written songs. We are together all the time.”
They ultimately agreed to not rehearse away from the set, so when the director said “action” they’d have fresh interactions. “I didn’t know how he was going to say his lines, and he didn’t know how I was going to say mine,” continued Hill. “It was the only way for it to be fresh, present, real and authentic, especially when you know someone so well.”
McGraw’s 17th studio album, “Standing Room Only,” drops on Aug. 25.