New York (AP) — She’s from Texas I can tell by the way she’s two-steppin’ ’round the “Middle of Nowhere.”
Kacey Musgraves’ sixth studio album isn’t so much a love letter to her home of the Lone Star State as much as it is a place for profundity — a celebration of sounds familiar, new, old and revived, delivered with her glassy vocal style and cheeky wit.
But she’s not straight honky-tonking on “Middle of Nowhere.” Her classic genre-hybridity is still in full effect: from the swaying sunset-pop of “I Believe In Ghosts” to the bluegrass-tinged banjo storytelling of “Abilene” to a brief vocal melody in the opening verse of “Loneliest Girl” that bares strikes resemblance to Post Malone’s “Circles.”
“Middle of Nowhere” is a move away from the acoustic meditations of her last album, 2024’s “Deeper Well,” with its kaleidoscopic warmth and ’60s-folk-informed storytelling. But to call it a return to the capital-C Country of her early records may be too myopic. Sure, steel guitar is a primary fixture of most of the album’s 13-tracks — courtesy of Nashville stalwart Paul Franklin — but this is not a direct recall to 2013’s “Same Trailer Different Park” or 2015’s “Pageant Material.” With some very real exceptions, like the reappearance of her John Prine-informed humor on the laugh-out-loud funny “Dry Spell,” with its romantic guitars and lascivious lyrics that would make Sabrina Carpenter blush. And her cannabis-infused cleverness on “Rhinestoned.”
But those expecting, say, the disco-pop that ornamented 2018’s “Golden Hour,” which earned her album of the year at the 2019 Grammys, or 2021’s divorce record, “star-crossed,” will be charmed by a new era of Musgraves’ songwriting. She isn’t interested in rehashing the past on “Middle of Nowhere,” but she is pulling from her roots. Life, she’s lived a couple, and that wisdom abounds on songs about making your own way.
It is amplified by her features, which are inspired and sparse. From the irreverent Billy Strings on the balladic “Everybody Wants to Be a Cowboy,” the soft vocal harmonies of Gregory Alan Isakov on the traditionalist “Coyote,” to the standout “Horses and Divorces” with Miranda Lambert — a delicious resolution from the pair of former frenemies — with its norteño accordion and shout-along lyrics. “We both love Willie,” they unite, “But I mean, really … what a——— doesn’t like Willie?”
It’s a fitting introduction to the track that follows, “Uncertain, TX.” That one further builds out Musgraves’ Mexican musical influences, with its accordion and familiar rhythms, amplified with generous cowbell and the great Willie Nelson himself. Both songs double as crucial reminders that much of Texas culture and music is Mexican ; norteño a kind of country music by another name. (The only thing missing from the feature list? A spot from a regional Mexican artist, though anyone who needs to scratch that itch may do so by pressing play on the sexy, bilingual “Lost In Translation,” her 2025 collaboration with the star Carin León.)
Everything’s bigger in Texas — songs, feelings, opportunities to cross genre lines and borders, even voids. It’s the “Middle of Nowhere,” after all, and all space makes for some addictive songwriting.
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“Middle of Nowhere” by Kacey Musgraves
Four stars out of five.
On repeat: “Loneliest Girl,” “Horses and Divorces,” “Uncertain, TX”
Skip it: “Hell On Me,” to spare some tears
For fans of: Texas wildflowers, resiliency, getting it on
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