Tonight, Thursday, May 8, at 8:00 pm EST, the Academy of Country Music will host one of country music’s biggest events of the year. This year’s ACM Awards features country music’s finest all competing for the same awards. However, the awards aren’t the only thing that will garner some attention. Miranda Lambert, Reba McEntire, and Lainey Wilson will also debut their new single, “Trailblazer”.
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Wilson, Lambert, and McEntire will debut the single at the ACM awards tonight, not only to celebrate the evening, but also to pay homage to all of those musicians who came before them, and those who will come after. Concerning the sentimental content of the single, the country music trio sat down with Billboard and divulged the motivation behind the song.
Behind Lainey Wilson and Company’s Sentimental Single
Lainey Wilson, Miranda Lambert, Reba McEntire, and Brandy Clark all wrote this single on Miranda Lambert’s back porch in Texas.
“[We were] trying to figure out, ‘What’s the right message for this trio?’” Lambert told Billboard, recalling the drafting experience.
A daunting question, but one the trio was able to answer. Regarding the inspiration for the single, Wilson added that they “were just having a conversation about how both [Lambert and McEntire] have influenced me and [about] passing the torch and blazing trails for each other.”
“Generation after generation, it’s going to continue,” Wilson continued. “But we got to keep blazing those trails for the next one.”
In addition to paying their respects to their biggest influences, they all did so for each other within the song’s lyrics as well. In the single, the lyrics allude to Lambert’s hit song, “Kerosene”. The lyrics also mention Wilson and McEntire’s home states of Louisiana and Oklahoma.
“We wanted to lean in pretty hard to paying tribute to each person,” said Lambert. “We had to do it strategically though, because we didn’t want it to be so blatant.”
For the trio, the song aims to do far more than just celebrate country music. Lainey Wilson divulged that she remembered “thinking that this could be a song that a grandmother and a daughter and a grandchild could listen to and not just about the history of country music…”
“If we’re not thinking about the people that we’re singing to then they’re not going to be able to relate,” Wilson concluded.
To see this song come to fruition live, make sure you tune into the ACM awards tonight. Also, if you miss it, don’t fret. The song will be available on streaming services tonight at 8:00 pm EST.
Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
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