Needless to say, 2020 was a challenging year. In a year bookended by a devastating tornado in March and a bombing on Christmas morning, with the COVID-19 pandemic sandwiched in between, Nashville has been dealt its fair share of...
Booming production can’t drown out Reyna Roberts’ awe-inspiring vocals. With fire-red hair and a voice to match, Roberts is coming for her country crown in 2021. Case in point: her latest single, “Stompin’ Grounds,” with its rollicking guitars and...
Zoë Nutt has a reliable sense of grit that sees her through any challenge. Raised in Knoxville, Tennessee by a musical family, Nutt spent much of her childhood analyzing lyrics, yet believed at the time that music was an...
“Guitar is the great lighthouse of my life,” says Daniel Donato. The musician speaks with gusto about his work ─ and for good reason. On his debut album, A Young Man’s Country, he invites the listener into what it...
As Nashville’s female-focused record label Songs & Daughters approaches its one-year anniversary this month, or “first birthday” as president Nicolle Galyon calls it, the artist collective continues to move into the future with a new publishing arm. In partnership...
René Kladzyk says she’s always been drawn to melodrama – but some of the songs she found herself writing were almost “too embarrassing” to record, at least for her more esoteric, conceptually-driven musical project Ziemba. As she developed a...
Tenille Townes’ The Lemonade Stand is more than a major label debut album – it’s a safe space. On it, Townes asks big questions and expresses even bigger emotions, her compassionate worldview on full display as her childhood dream...
The murder of George Floyd at the hands of a former Minneapolis police officer has sparked protests across the world calling for justice for Floyd and the end to systemic racism in America. Some of those voices are coming...
Brandi Carlile crossed a music threshold when she made her headlining debut at Madison Square Garden in 2019, the folk music visionary watching a seemingly out-of-reach dream come to life before her eyes. The legendary venue chronicled Carlile’s journey...
Nashville is known for being a giving community, a gift that’s often expressed through music. As the world grapples with the jarring reality of COVID-19, many artists continue to share music as a source of healing, including many of...
On January 21, CMT announced that it would devote half of its primetime video hours to female artists, effective immediately. For years, the conversation surrounding the dismal statistics that prove women are played significantly less than men have dominated...
Brandi Carlile’s multi-night headlining debut at the Ryman Auditorium on Tuesday (Jan. 14) was as much a display of empathy and forgiveness as it was about Carlile’s storied catalog. The beloved star set this tone by opening with a...
“Why won’t you listen?” It’s a simple question packed with dense meaning, and is the core message of Kyshona Armstrong’s new song “Listen,” premiering exclusively with Audiofemme. It’s the title track from her forthcoming LP, set for release on February...
“Nobody logical in life ever gave me a shot. They were always a little left of center.” This wasn’t just a proclamation made by Tanya Tucker during her headlining show at the Ryman Auditorium on Sunday (Jan. 12), but...
When Aubrie Sellers’ new album, Far From Home, is released, you’ll notice a distinct message etched into the vinyl: “We are traveling through this wild, wild land.” It’s a line from the title track that sets the pace for...
Let’s face it: country music isn’t known for being the most welcoming genre to women. Since its inception circa 1920, women have long been embroiled in a battle of equal airplay and representation, a battle that still rages on...
With the end of the year comes a time of reflection. Looking back on this year in country music, the firestorm of conversation about the lack of women on country radio spilled into 2019, while new artists like Lil...
Year after year, the same holiday standards come pouring through our speakers when the calendar flips to December (or before Halloween in recent years). While these often become ubiquitous, there are several artists who deliver original renditions of these...
With her new holiday special, The Kacey Musgraves Christmas Show, Kacey Musgraves proves that her star power only continues to grow. The idea for the made-for-TV event arose from a conversation Musgraves had with her band leader last year...
Carrie Underwood gets in touch with the bold side of her artistry with her new single “Drinking Alone.” This week, Underwood released a music video for the smoldering track, and in the four-minute clip, the superstar acts as a...
Each year in Nashville, the women of country music gather to celebrate one another and provide an important platform for the new artists working to break ground in the genre through CMT Next Women of Country. Founded by CMT...
“Goner,” the new single from Oakland band Half Stack, comes two years after their last release, 2018’s full-length Quitting Time. With an easy narrative and simplistic lyrics, it’s the first track from their upcoming EP, Aw Hell. Half Stack...
Last week, after publishing “Don’t Take Your Guns to Town,” I took the train across the East River to see a movie. A bit of distraction seemed necessary in that moment, even if it was in the form of...