Miranda Lambert – Crisco
When it comes to music, Miranda Lambert isn’t playing. The fierce songwriter from Lindale, Texas has always leaned hard into Lone Star traditions, while moving what country music can be forward with a strong set of roots. Leave it to the woman who co-wrote and co-produced Ella Langley’s tsunami of a song “Choosin’ Texas” to return with music that takes a whole new spin on what dance hall cowboys can embrace with a strong sense of retro and a whole lot of fun.
Expanding on “A Song To Sing,” one of her two ACM Music Event of the Year nominations, Lambert takes the Chris Stapleton duet’s roller rink innocence – and deep dives into a pair of distinctive retro dancefloor sounds. Drawing on the good timing two steppery of “Urban Cowboy” and the sleek, disco urbanity of “Saturday Night Fever,” Lambert pioneers of a whole new sound with her first release with MCA, “Crisco.”
Literally, country and disco twisted together by luxurious strings and a melody that twirls around listeners. With lyrics that invoke in a real life way Starland Vocal Band’s “Afternoon Delight,” Glen Campbell’s “Southern Nights” and Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton’s “Islands in the Stream,” as well as outright name-checking Conway (Twitty), Loretta (Lynn) and the Seventies, one can’t help but feel brighter, lighter and ready to kick up their heels.
“We wanted something that feels familiar but also fresh, which is really hard to do,” Lambert enthuses. “We leaned into all the things I grew up loving about country music – Glen Campbell, Kenny and Dolly; very ’70s and ’80s. It’s a fun mix of all these sides of country music that I’ve never fully explored before, even down to using strings in a bigger way. I almost can’t believe I’ve made this many records without really going there, but it was magical to hear how much strings can transform a song.”
To really bring that recipe home, the song co-written with Aaron Raitiere, Jesse Frasure and Chill Fellacheck boasts a chorus that breaks it down:
Baby, we’ve been cooking with Crisco
Ain’t we mixin’ country and disco
Stir it around, give it a spin
And it’s a rhinestone world we’re livin’ in…
Further paying homage to the era and the influences, Lambert will debut the ebullient confection at the 61st Academy of Country Music Awards this Sunday, May 17, streaming live from the MGM Grand Garden Arena on Prime Video at 8 p.m. ET.
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