\n<\/p>\n
\n\tIn Ashley Monroe<\/a>\u2019s writing room on the West Side of Nashville, you can find all sorts of relics of a career well-lived. There are acoustic guitars played with Vince Gill<\/a>, framed hymns she grew up singing back in Knoxville, and a trio of posters on the wall from a Pistol Annies<\/a> tour, her band<\/a> with Angaleena Presley and Miranda Lambert. On a shelf in the corner, there are drawings by good friends Allison Moorer and Shelby Lynne, and, by the window, there\u2019s a black-and-white print of a woman holding a sign that says \u201cnot your bitch.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tWhat you won\u2019t find, though, are any awards.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cNope, not one,\u201d Monroe says with a shrug, swiveling on a green velvet chair in a tank top and slouchy jacket. \u201cWant to give me one?\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tIt\u2019s a warm spring morning, and Monroe\u2019s been here since her son went off to school. This is her sanctuary, her creative space, where she comes to write songs and pretend that the new Nashville is the old Nashville, back when she and her friends were just making up country songs and getting high, and people\u2019s worth wasn\u2019t measured by streaming numbers or trophies on a shelf. Nearly two decades since her debut album, Satisfied<\/em>, she\u2019s become one of the town\u2019s most beloved singers and writers: a voice so mesmerizing that Jack White once pulled over while driving just to listen, and drew attention from Gill when she was a teenager (he went on to produce two of her records). Despite all that, it\u2019s usually been someone else\u2019s name on the big marquees, on the radio, on the award show stages sniffling through their speeches. Nashville\u2019s been breaking Monroe\u2019s heart and, until recently, she smiled through it publicly. It was just easier that way.<\/p>\n \n\tBut in April, Monroe surprise-released Dear Nashville<\/em>, an album that brought all these latent feelings to the surface. The Tennessee native was ready to admit that even though so many of her country music<\/a> dreams had come true, there was also a lot of pain and disappointment, including years of being the \u201cnext big thing,\u201d being signed and dropped by labels multiple times, and some \u201cawful\u201d radio programmers. She\u2019s had her albums, including 2013\u2019s exquisite Like a Rose<\/em>, put in an unwilling battle with Kacey Musgraves\u2019 Same Trailer Different Park<\/a><\/em>, just because they were both projects by women released in the same year. She\u2019s co-written songs that were Number One on country radio, but never for her solo work. And she\u2019s never taken home an award. You can\u2019t blame Monroe then for titled the LP\u2019s opening track \u201cI Hate Nashville.\u201d<\/p>\n