Ashley McBryde sets release date of 8 September for forthcoming album – The Devil I Know, new single ‘Learned To Lie’ is out now, accompanying the release.
GRAMMY Award winner Ashley McBryde has made a name for herself with a string of critically acclaimed albums. Now, McBryde returns on 8th September with The Devil I Know, via Warner Music Nashville.
“When it was time to put together The Devil I Know, my band and I did what we always do: got together in the purple building in East Nashville, played through a bunch of songs and discussed where we wanted it to go,” shares McBryde. “We decided to take all the things that people tend to give us a hard time for and turn it up.
“‘Y’all are too country.’ We leaned into that – more country it is. ‘Y’all are awfully rock leaning for a country artist.’ Is that so? You ain’t seen nothin’ yet. ‘Last thing y’all need is another tender, finger pickin’ song.’ Oh? Tender makes you uneasy, cowboy? I hear you. Let’s see how much more tender we can be. We listened to all those opinions and said, ‘I hear you. I understand what you’re saying.’ But sadly, there’s no room on the record for your opinion. We’ll do what we want.”
Accompanying today’s announcement is the release of “Learned To Lie,” another stunning example of McBryde’s songwriting vulnerability:
I traced it back to a couple months before I was born
Must’ve heard my momma tell my daddy
That she was tired ’cause babies make you tired
But deep down she was just unhappy
I think my father did the best that he could do
He rarely made it to the dinner table
Said he was working late, but he was working late
Fogging up the windows of an ’89 Sable
I, I learned to cry
Quietly I learned to pray
Silently inside a house where the devil played
And I hate that it runs in my blood
I hate how easy it comes
I wish I’d learned how to love the same way I
Learned to lie
“‘Learned to Lie’ was a hard one; I wrote it with Sean McConnell and Nicolette Hayford,” McBryde reflects. “After it was written, I called my mom to let her know that I had told a little bit more of our story as a family. I said, ‘It’s going to be hard to hear, but none of it is untrue.’” The track is a beautiful, stunningly honest track that sees McBryde lift the veil on her soul.
