Interview: Kacey Musgraves on her new album, 'Middle of Nowhere'

March 14, 2026·33 min·1 clip

Kacey Musgraves announces her sixth album, Middle of Nowhere, and reveals her renewed interest in traditional country after time at the Texas-Mexico border.

A special Saturday drop, and a clear turn back toward the floor. Anne Powers introduces Kacey Musgraves as a country giant entering a new phase, with Middle of Nowhere announced as her sixth album and due May 1st. The tone is warm without making the rollout feel shiny. Powers places the record after Golden Hour, when Musgraves had pushed past country and now seems pulled back toward two-step rhythms and Texas-Mexico border color. Dry Spell is the first signal. Julie Height begins with the single, which the intro frames as a cowboy shuffle with classic country double meanings, so the direction of the record comes through quickly. Musgraves keeps circling back to balance. She talks about muting parts one at a time and using the eraser tool until the arrangement has taste, space, and enough air around it. That is the useful detail. For her, production is not polish added after the writing. She describes the shape of a song as something she can feel in her body. The collaborator talk stays specific. Height names the close writing circles around Shane McAnally, Luke Laird, Brady Clark, Josh Osborne, and Natalie Hemby, then sets them beside Daniel Tashin and Ian Fitchuk from the Golden Hour era. Musgraves does not turn it into a ranking. She says each crew brings something different, and the new songs needed some of the bite she finds in those older rooms. The pace sounds intentionally loose. Without a hard deadline pressing on the sessions, she could amble, gather people, and wait to see what kind of super country material showed up. By the end, the dance floor matters as much as the studio. Musgraves remembers a younger cowgirl and everybody having a good time dancing together, then talks about Texas dance halls as places where music can soften differences. The image is quiet but sticky. A standard album preview becomes a conversation about rhythm, restraint, collaboration, and what happens when a room moves together.

As heard by us

A craft-forward Kacey Musgraves interview that keeps the rollout framing from taking over.

Kacey Musgraves' sixth album, Middle of Nowhere, gets its best treatment when the piece stays near the making of the record. Julie Height and Musgraves move from the first single, "Dry Spell," into the contrast between the two creative crews, and that gives the album a sense of…

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Hear Kacey Musgraves explain why she wanted to two-step back into country.

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