Ashley McBryde just took her new “What If We Don’t” single to national TV. The Arkansas native performed the song, from her forthcoming Wild album, on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.
“What If We Don’t” is written by McBryde, Terri Jo Box, and Randall Clay. The song is part of her next album, Wild, out on May 8.
“For me, this song brings about being at peace with answers you’ll never get,” McBryde says. “And whether you chose to do this or that, the other decision, the one that you didn’t make, you still live with those consequences. Things that hurt don’t just stay. Things that hurt turn into a lyric. The lyric turns into a melody. The melody turns into a song. The song goes on a record. And now, we have created a bridge from hurt to heal. And it did it for us to write it, and it did it for us as a band to record it. And now it gets to do that for other people when they listen to it.”
Ashley McBryde’s New Album, ‘Wild’
When announcing Wild, McBryde admitted she was taking some chances on the record, a project that also includes “Arkansas Mud”, “Bottle Tells Me So”, “Hand Me Downs,” and more.
“Sometimes going with your gut is the scariest thing you can do… and the most necessary,” McBryde says. “This record felt like building a tree fort from some pieces we’d been needing to put to good use and some building materials I had to go scout out and look for. And piece by piece, trusting it would all hold together in the end. I’m so ready for y’all to hear it.
“‘Wild’ is the name,” she continues. “That’s the spirit of the record. The fear, the chaos, the hard truths, and the little kid in me who always kept dreaming big. Wild is out May 8. … I can’t wait for you to hear more of the story.”
Ashley McBryde Opens Up About Her Sobriety
In 2022, McBryde quietly quit drinking, waiting almost a year to announce her sobriety. In a recent interview, the Grand Ole Opry member recalls the moment that made her finally get help for her alcohol addiction.
“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 remembers. “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.”
Photo Credit: Courtesy of NBC