ASHLEY McBRYDE ON FIRST GRAMMY AWARD WIN:
“WE DID IT TOGETHER”
Chart-Topper “Never Wanted To Be That Girl” with Carly Pearce Named
Best Country Duo/Group Performance by The Recording Academy
Marking the First Win in the Category by Two Women
Photo Credit: Benjo Arwas/Getty Images for The Recording Academy
Praised by the Los Angeles Times as “one of Nashville’s most emotionally incisive songwriters with a voice that can channel pain as vividly as defiance,” Ashley McBryde earns her first award from The Recording Academy for her chart-topping duet “Never Wanted To Be That Girl” with Carly Pearce, marking the first win in the category by two women.
“It’s Carly’s first [GRAMMY] nomination and it’s my first number one at Country radio,” the six-time nominee beamed while receiving the award for Best Country Duo/Group Performance. “We’ve performed this song so many times on stage together, and it’s been so nice for our friendship. We did it together. Thank you, thank you.”
Written by Pearce, McBryde and co-producer Shane McAnally, “Never Wanted To Be That Girl” is from the perspective of two women – the single girl thanking the guy who helped change her flat tire and the wife at home – discovering the man they’re involved with has someone else. The shattering truth in a text – for McBryde – and the reality of where he’s been when he gets home – for Pearce – finds the two women reeling as they consider their own blind spots in a painfully sobering moment. As the second female duet to top the Country radio charts in 30 years, “Never Wanted To Be That Girl” was also named the 2022 Music Event of the Year by both the Academy of Country Music and the Country Music Association.
McBryde also received a 2023 nod for her critically acclaimed collaborative project Ashley McBryde Presents: Lindeville, which marked her third consecutive nomination for Best Country Album and garnered recognition as one of the best albums of the year, earning a spot as the only Country album on NPR’s “The 50 Best Albums of 2022” and one of five on Rolling Stone’s all-genre “The 100 Best Albums of 2022,” along with landing on the best-of lists from Variety, PAPER Magazine, Billboard, Los Angeles Times, Stereogum, Slate and Tennessean, among many more.
Cited by NPR as “a mischievous, and mightily pleasing, departure from the prescribed progression of a mainstream country career,” Ashley McBryde Presents: Lindeville was produced by John Osborne and features performances from Brothers Osborne, Brandy Clark, Aaron Raitiere, Pillbox Patti, Caylee Hammack and Benjy Davis, as Variety observes, “The very existence of an album like Ashley McBryde Presents: Lindeville is enough to restore your faith in Nashville, however far afield it might have wandered,”
Summed up by Stereogum, “There’s a whole lot of beautiful writerly vision at work on Lindeville, but it wouldn’t matter if the songs weren’t great. Guess what? The songs are great… A lot of people put a lot of work into this record, and they made something that resonates on a deep, emotional level. Give it up for them.”
The Arkansas native is set to perform Ashley McBryde Presents: Lindeville Live for two sold-out nights at the historic Ryman Auditorium February 15 and 16, featuring the cast of collaborators and special guests. Livestream tickets are available at AshleyMcBryde.com.
About Ashley McBryde
CMA and ACM award winner Ashley McBryde cut her teeth playing country songs in rural biker bars – and it shows. The Grand Ole Opry member’s 2018 major label debut Girl Going Nowhere (Warner Music Nashville) charmed The New York Times, NPR, Rolling Stone, Paste, The Washington Post and more, all en route to landing a GRAMMY nomination for Best Country Album. McBryde closed out 2019 with ACM New Female Artist, CMT Breakout Artist, a New Artist of the Year win at the 53rd Annual CMA Awards and two nominations for the 2020 GRAMMYs for Best Country Song and Best Country Solo Performance for “Girl Goin’ Nowhere.” Her follow-up Never Will was tagged by Rolling Stone as one of the most anticipated of the year alongside NPR, who also ranked her Top 10 RIAA Platinum-Certified single “One Night Standards” as one of the best songs of 2019. The album earned McBryde a 2021 GRAMMY nomination for Best Country Album, making Never Will the only album nominated for Country Album of the Year by the ACMs, CMAs and the Recording Academy in the same award season. Her GRAMMY-winning duet with Carly Pearce, “Never Wanted To Be That Girl,” went all the way to No. 1 and earned McBryde and Pearce the ACM and CMA award for Musical Event of the Year. McBryde was also honored with the 2022 CMA International Artist Achievement Award for the most significant creative growth, development and promotion of the country music industry outside of the United States. The Arkansas-native invites listeners to Ashley McBryde Presents: Lindeville, a collaborative project featuring Brothers Osborne, Brandy Clark, Pillbox Patti, Caylee Hammack, Aaron Raitiere and more, earning McBryde her third consecutive GRAMMY nomination for Best Country Album, making her a six-time GRAMMY nominee. Upon its release on September 30, Ashley McBryde Presents: Lindeville garnered applause from The New York Times, NPR, Variety, Vulture, Esquire, Rolling Stone, Billboard and Stereogum, among many more. McBryde recently wrapped The Judds: The Final Tour with Wynonna and will join her collaborators and special guests for two sold-out nights at the Ryman Auditorium for Ashley McBryde Presents: Lindeville Live on February 15-16. McBryde is slated to play headlining shows, festivals and three dates with Eric Church on The Outsiders Revival Tour this spring and summer. For more information, visit AshleyMcBryde.com or follow her on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter @AshleyMcBryde and TikTok @AshleyMcBrydeMusic.