Kacey Musgraves didn’t stay in the realm of nowhere for long. Just months after wrapping up her global “Deeper Well” tour overseas, she will return May 1 with her sixth album, “Middle of Nowhere,” a collection that promises to have a more distinctly Texas-country flavor than some of the releases that preceded it, if the descriptive language and imagery are any indication.
Musgraves is previewing the forthcoming set with the album’s first single and music video, “Dry Spell,” being released Wednesday in conjunction with the album announcement. The singer co-directed the amusing and saucy video with Hannah Lux Davis; watch it here.
The new album will include featured guest appearances by Miranda Lambert — putting to rest rumors of a feud, or at least an ongoing one — along with Willie Nelson, Billy Strings and Gregory Alan Isakov. (Scroll down for the full track list.) It can be pre-ordered here.
Starting with “Golden Hour,” which won the album of the year Grammy in 2018, Musgraves’ albums have taken on more of a folk-pop tinge, though she has never abandoned the country genre she started out with. But “Middle of Nowhere” looks to markedly return to and expand even further on those roots, even as the official album description qualifies it as “genre-less.”
“Written during a period of reflection and post-breakup clarity, this collection of songs finds Musgraves leaning intentionally into open space and traditional Western elements,” the release reads. “Pedal steel, accordion and Texas dancehall rhythms provide a nostalgic framework that she flips on its head in signature fashion. It is a sonic love letter to the musical borders of country, echoing influence from adjacent genres such as bluegrass, pop, and even bits of Norteño and zydeco.”
It may mark a broad return not just to the sounds country and its neighboring styles but to the sense of humor that was particularly apparent on her first two albums — or at least that is plainly evident as the just-released “Dry Spell” goes. The lyrics have Musgraves literally counting the days since she last had relations with a man (and refer to how much longer it’s been since she had satisfying relations). “I’m so lonely, lonely with a capital H / If you know what I mean / I’ve been sitting on the washing machine,” she sings.
The music video does not take place in a laundromat, but rather a supermarket, where every piece of food Musgraves or the extras come across manages to be sensually suggestive, not so subtly echoing the lyrics’ sexual frustration.
The song some fans may most look forward to hearing, though, out of sheer curiosity, is “Horses and Divorces,” her collaboration with Lambert. In the days leading up to the album announcement, Musgraves and Lambert both took to their Instagram Stories with messages apparently directed at one another that many onlookers already assumed to be lyrics from a possible collab. “You knew I’d said some things about you,” wrote Musgraves, to which Lambert responded on her account, “Well, I’ve done my fair share of shit talkin’ too.”
There was widely thought to be some bad blood between the two stars dating back at least to when Lambert had a huge hit with the Musgraves-co-penned “Mama’s Broken Heart,” which the latter singer had wanted to release as her own debut single but gave up to the more established performer, reluctantly. Musgraves’ IG Story even includes a tantalizing clip from the CMA Awards when Lambert, accepting an award for female vocalist of the year, congratulated Musgraves for her best new artist win, and the show cut to a reaction shot of Musgraves with a “not having it” look on her face. If indeed there was a beef at that time, the two artists are now acknowledging it… and having some fun with it.
Musgraves spoke to the overarching themes of the new album as part of the announcement. Included in this was the idea that some of the songs seriously deal with the idea of being fine with being alone and outside of a relationship (even if “Dry Spell” bucks that contentment with as far less serious take on the subject).
“The bulk of this record was made during the longest single period of my life,” Musgraves said, “and I found that for the first time, it actually felt incredible being alone and existing in a space not defined by anyone else. I became fascinated with the concept of liminal space, both geographical and emotional. We don’t linger in these transitional, empty spaces long enough and rush to define where or whatever is next. I became so at ease with being in the ‘middle of nowhere’ in many senses and sitting in the un-comfort of the undefined. I had a lot of time for creative ambling and leaning into myself in different ways; horses, humor, writing with my early collaborators again, and living out my very simple, inspired life between Texas, Tennessee and Mexico.”
The possibility that the regional country accents might be lyrical as well as musical is evidenced in song titles like “Abilene,” “Everybody Wants to Be a Cowboy” (which features Strings), “Uncertain, Texas” (the Nelson collaboration, named after a real Lone Star town), “Rhinestoned” and “Mexico Honey.”
“Middle of Nowhere” track list:
1. Middle of Nowhere
2. Dry Spell
3. Back on the Wagon
4. I Believe in Ghosts
5. Abilene
6. Coyote feat. Gregory Alan Isakov
7. Loneliest Girl
8. Everybody Wants To Be a Cowboy feat. Billy Strings
9. Horses and Divorces feat. Miranda Lambert
10. Uncertain, Texas feat. Willie Nelson
11. Rhinestoned
12. Mexico Honey
13. Hell on Me
