Ashley Monroe may be one of the most country of country artists, with a natural vocal twang and a gift for writing the type of rich story-songs that define the genre, but on her new album Tennessee Lightning, the east Tennessee native doesn’t paint in only one color.
Over the LP’s 17 songs, Monroe touches on the sounds of Americana, country-rock, gospel, and even indie and alt-rock. The song “Hot Rod Pipe Dream,” in particular, evokes powerful women-fronted bands like Veruca Salt and the Breeders.
In a new interview on Rolling Stone’s Nashville Now podcast, Monroe dismisses with the tendency to overly dissect genres. Like Linda Martell said on Beyonce’s Cowboy Carter album, “Genres are a funny little concept, aren’t they?”
“I was thinking the other day [about ] eating a sandwich that was so great, but all you could think about is ‘What would you call this? How did they make this?’ You wouldn’t enjoy it as much,” Monroe says, drawing a culinary analogy to hard and strict genres. “Take a bite out of it and let it touch you and don’t even worry about it.”
For Monroe, her listening habits run the gamut, from Peggy Lee and Lynyrd Skynyrd, she says, to Neil Young and A$AP Rocky: “It’s the ebb and flow of everything. Whatever is making me go ‘aw yeah.’”
In the Nashville Now interview, Monroe, a member of the Pistol Annies with Miranda Lambert and Angaleena Presley, opened up about her songwriting, especially with Shelby Lynne, who gifted her the “Tennessee Lightning” nickname; offered her take on the likelihood of another Annies album; and shared a harrowing story of a 2010 overdose.
Download and subscribe to Rolling Stone’s weekly country-music podcast, Nashville Now, hosted by senior music editor Joseph Hudak, on Apple Podcasts or Spotify (or wherever you get your podcasts). New episodes drop every Wednesday and feature interviews with everyone from songwriter Margo Price, comic Dusty Slay, and singer-guitarist Lukas Nelson.
