Page 104 - OVATION Magazine (Issue 1)

MIRANDA’S RIGHT
Coheed and Cambria, the Wallflowers, Cage the Elephant, Eric Church, and Patty Griffin’s Flaming Red.
Wildcard, Lambert’s seventh studio offering, is hands down her most diverse. Crunchy Zeppelin-meets-Fleetwood-Mac rockers (“Locomotive,”“Mess with My Head”), swampy gospel featuring the sweltering McCrary Sisters (“Holy Wa- ter”), a waltz/two-step hybrid perfect for Gruene Hall (“Tequila Does”), vintage country (“Dark Bars”), and her usual tongue-in-cheekiness (“White Trash,” “It All Comes Out in the Wash,” “Way Too Pretty for Prison” with emerging country girl-power denizen Maren Morris) tem- per a record that seeks new horizons.
“Before [we started this record], I was just tired and sad, but I wasn’t that bro- ken,” Lambert says.“I got a divorce—so what? Happens to people all the time. But
once I got through it and moved on, I felt rejuvenated. I’ve been making music and touring the road for a long time. People get forced to where they have to reinvent themselves. I didn’t have to do that.
“Part of my career was built on my
Ready enough to take these new songs out on the road.With Road-
side Bars & Pink Guitars 3—featuring rotating support from Morris and Elle King, with newcomers Caylee Hammack, Tenille Townes, and Ashley McBryde—
“I’ll never not feel at home in a honkytonk. It’s not shameful to be
drawn to places where the stories are.”
being defiant, you know, my image and how people saw me,” she continues.“At some point, you get tired of that. So at 35, I can calm down and don’t have to yell to prove my point anymore.There’s this fresh getting-started-all-over-again vibe that has appeared, and I’m so ready!”
look for fun, cocktails, laughter, animals, and a lot of great songs.As she raves,“I’m inspired by all these girls, especially the young girls.They keep my fire going. Ev- erybody has their own swagger and their own style, so this is going to be a night of some really badass music.
Miranda’s Mutts
A particular puppy love drives the country star’s primary cause.
Beyond being a kick- ass country star, Miranda Lambert is a
fierce animal lover. Just
ask 12-year-old golden/ Australian-shepherd mixes Waylon and Jessi, rescued from the side of the road
in Oklahoma; six-year-old comfort retriever Bellamy from West Palm Beach’s Big Dog Ranch; or nine- year-old Chihuahua Cher, found in a dumpster at five weeks weighing a mere 1.5 pounds. “There’s some- thing so soothing, especial- ly about rescue dogs—and
senior dogs. They calm you,” says Lambert, who has put her love for aban- doned animals to work.
Ten years ago, Lambert and her mother, Bev, founded MuttNation as
a multifaceted founda-
tion designed to help the dogs who need it most. With food drives for local shelters at her shows, emergency and disaster relief, puppy-mill interven- tions, aid to shelters in all 50 states, animal transport, the annual Cause for the Paws benefit concert, and
high-profile animal- adoption drives at CMA Music Fest, the Opry, and on tour, she’s making her animal love tangible.
“My dogs don’t know I’m Miranda Lambert,” she muses. “They just know I’m their mom. We should all be loved like that, and Mutt-
Nation helps support the people taking care of these animals who were just dumped or abandoned.” muttnation.com —H.G.
110 | OVATION
FALL 2019
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