Ashley McBryde is opening up about her new album, Wild. Out on May 8, the record includes her current single, “What If We Don’t,” plus “Arkansas Mud,” “Hand Me Downs,” “Bottle Tells Me So,” and more.
Wild is McBryde’s fifth record, and also her most personal.
“Looking at the vinyl track listing, it describes the spirit, the first half of the record,” McBryde shares on social media. “It describes the kind of fear that comes along with recognizing that I’m about to start talking about my alcoholism. It represents the chaos of recognizing relationship problems and where they came from, what was modeled for me, how I let it shape me, and most importantly, little me sitting on the floor, dreaming up what I would be like when I got older.”
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Ashley McBryde Is Eager For Fans to Hear Her New ‘Wild’ Album
McBryde admits she is eager for fans to hear all 11 songs on Wild, a project she poured all of herself into.
“When you make the record, from making the record to releasing the record is a year, sometimes more,” McBryde explains. “So if you can think about living life every day and doing shows every night while holding your breath a little bit, and then when the record comes out, you go, ‘Finally,’ and you can put all of the songs into the show that you’ve been wanting to put into the show.”
“Maybe it feels sort of like, you know when you watch videos of like kindergarten graduations? How happy everyone is?” the 42-year-old reflects. “It’s a little bit similar to that feeling.”
Ashley McBryde Talks About Sobriety
McBryde’s “Bottle Tells Me So” is just one of the songs that touches on her sobriety, after quietly battling alcoholism for years. The song says, “One of us is gonna break one of these days / If this ain’t bottom, it’s as far down as I ever wanna go / The party’s over and as always, I’m the last one to know / For the bottle tells me so.”
In 2022, McBryde got sober, waiting almost an entire year to reveal she had quietly quit drinking. She recently opened up about her decision to give up alcohol, and the heartbreaking moment that made her realize she was unable to quit drinking on her own.
“I woke up at another artist’s house, another female artist, in a bed that’s not mine, in pajamas that aren’t mine,” McBryde recounts on Bobbycast. “And I was like, ‘Oh my God, that must have been a doozy.’ I’m thirsty. I don’t know where I am, and I don’t know where water is, so I’ll just go find water.”
“When I went to find water, I found a living room,” she continues. “In that living room was my team. And they said, ‘We need you to stop.’ And I said, ‘I need me to stop, too.’ And that was when I found out that she took me to her house that night, after we’d been out, to make sure I didn’t die.”