Ella Langley is so grateful for Lainey Wilson. It’s Wilson who has been a mentor and supporter for Langley, since the very beginning.
“She’s exactly how she is,” Langley boasts on Country Nights Live. ‘We met early on in town, and I actually opened a show for Lainey in 2023. It was before she had her big moment, right before she went on Yellowstone. There weren’t many people there. There were barely 200 people one night, barely 200 people the next night. When you think about what’s happened for both of us now, if we both put on a show together right now, what that room would look like.”
“She’s just been somebody that I’ve been able to lean on and ask questions,” she continues. “She answers in a real a– way. I don’t like fluff. I really don’t. I don’t like yes men. I don’t like people that just tell me what I want to hear. It actually is an attribute I dislike in somebody. So whenever I ask Lainey like, ‘Did you feel insane some days, like you’re losing your mind a little bit?’ She’s like, ‘Yes. Are you kidding me? I barely got it back.'”
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The admiration between Langley and Wilson goes both ways. It was Langley who was the most nominated artist heading into the 2025 ACM Awards, with Langley also walking away with the most trophies – and no one was prouder of her than Wilson.
“I could not be more thrilled,” Wilson shared with Everything Nash and other outlets, at a recent media event. “I could not be more excited to see it happening to a girl that just knows who she is. She shows up, and she rolls her sleeves up, and she is ready to kick down barn doors. You gotta have that spirit in this business. If you don’t have that spirit, there’s somebody behind you that’s going to have that spirt, and they’re going to knock down that barn door for you. So, she’s one of those.
“I would not be surprised if she comes in there with her broom and starts sweeping it up,” she adds. “And I’d be behind her with a dustpan … I was like, ‘Let’s go.’ I’m glad to see the community really taking notice in somebody who’s just got it. That’s a good feeling, especially as a female in the business. It’s good to see.”
Wilson also presented Langley with the prestigious Billboard‘s Rising Star Award last month.
“As soon as I met her, I knew she was different,” Wilson said at the time. “She had this spark and this go-getter attitude that I was drawn to, and the kind of attitude that it takes for anybody in this business to do it. Before I even heard her sing, I knew that she was pretty special. She’s the kind that just jumps in headfirst and gives it 190 percent. It don’t matter what it is. If that means her show, her songwriting, she’s in it, and I like people like that. There’s no doubt that she has already made her mark in this industry, and she ain’t going anywhere.
“She’s got the gut and the grits to be here as long as she wants to be, and she has become a dear friend … Any wisdom that has been passed on to me from the business, I tried to share it with Ella, and Ella seems like she’s all ears,” she continued. “She wants to listen. She wants to know more and do more and be more, and that’s what makes her a superstar. I’m proud of Ella, not just for being the trailblazing artist that she is, but for the heart that she’s got to go with it.”