Postcards From Texas by Miranda Lambert

Miranda Lambert may have hit it big in Nashville, but Texas will always be the country icon’s greatest muse. Like she did on the collaborative 2021 project *The Marfa Tapes* (joined by fellow Texans Jon Randall and Jack Ingram), Lambert shares sketches and vignettes of the Lone Star State, filtered through her equally introspective and humorous perspective. *Postcards From Texas* is Lambert’s ninth studio album, and the first solo LP she recorded in her home state of Texas since she was a teenager. Accordingly, the record feels homey and lived-in, like on the reflective and playful “Looking Back on Luckenbach” and the laidback love song “January Heart.” “Bitch on the Sauce (Just Drunk)” is more than just a cheeky title, teasing out the complications of a situationship. And opening track “Armadillo” is a barn-burning knee-slapper, with the unforgettable image of an armadillo with a “doobie.” Lambert tells Apple Music that *Postcards From Texas* is a product of recent life changes as well as her career as a whole. “With turning 40 and \[signing to\] a new record label, I felt new freedom,” she says. “And with that freedom, all I wanted to do was go home to reset so I could get strong to take on a whole new journey. And so I think this record is a snapshot of more like two decades versus the last two years. There\'s emotions that I\'ve felt for the last two decades as a woman \[and\] as an artist in this album. The only thing I haven\'t done is pick up a high armadillo in my car yet, but I want to.”Below, Lambert shares insight into several key tracks. **“Armadillo”** “Aaron Raitiere sent me that, the first song he sent me, and I was in Austria, actually, going down the road, because I played a show in Switzerland and \[my husband\] Brendan and I went to Austria. And we were driving through the mountains in Austria and I\'m putting on my earbuds, and I just turned on Aaron\'s like, ‘Here\'s one.’ And it said, ‘I met an armadillo out in Amarillo and he asked me for a ride.’ And I was like, ‘Okay, yes, 100 percent yes, I\'m cutting this.’ And I didn\'t even hear anymore. I handed Brendan an earbud and he was like, ‘Yes, 100 percent.’ I was like, ‘This should be the first song on the record.’ Just because it\'s fun and funny… If you\'re going to have an album full of songs and there\'s going to be so much emotion, you\'ve got to make sure you have the fun.” **“Dammit Randy”** “I\'ve definitely dragged it out too long in certain situations in my life. And I don\'t know if that\'s also, as you go through things in your life and as you get a little bit older, you\'re like, ‘Oh, well, now I\'ve seen what happens if you let it fester.’ So you just learn to cut it off.” **“Run”** “I think the reason that I love horses and I love Airstreams and I love the \[tour\] bus is because it is a way to run to something, not necessarily away from something. I think that\'s why I\'ve always been obsessed with trailers. I don\'t know if it\'s growing up on a tour bus or whatever, but I just feel like I can chase my dream but also have a piece of home.” **“Alimony”** “Shane \[McAnally\] walked into the barn, because we did one last push for writing for the record, and I\'m like, ‘I\'m making a record in Texas. I need to shuffle. Dang it, I need a shuffle. I have to.’ He was like, ‘Well, I got a title.’ And I was like, ‘What?’ And he was like, ‘If you\'re going to leave me in San Antonio, remember the alimony.’ And I was like, ‘I could literally punch you in the face right now.’ Dang it, why didn\'t I think of that? We got to use all of our little Texas puns, and it was fun.” **“I Hate Love Songs”** “It gives me chills, that song. It does. I wrote that in Marfa with \[Jon Randall\] and Jack \[Ingram\], and it\'s older. It\'s about six or seven years old, I think. That is sitting in the pain.” **“No Man’s Land”** “I don\'t think I could have written a song like this till now, because this is one of the newest on the album. Luke Dick had the idea, and I just love him because he gets girls. He\'s just such a man, but he\'s such a sensitive guy. He understands the wiring. He\'s a girl dad, too, so I think that probably helped. We never talked about that, and I want to talk to him about it and celebrate because I love this song so much, but it had to be done and it didn\'t need to be a ‘I\'m in no man\'s land with your finger in the air.’ That\'s not what this is. I want to be in your space. I want you to be in my space... I want you to know that I want you here, but I need to be me. And that\'s the song. I think we really made sure to get that point across that it\'s not a warning.”

Miranda Lambert shares poignant life lessons told through vignettes of a roadtrip across the Lone Star state on her charming tenth album

Miranda Lambert's 'Postcards From Texas' shows an artist happy to reconnect with the home that made her.

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On her ninth solo album, the US country star is still on peak songwriting form. Review by Thomas H Green.