A mature, evolving new album is coming from Kelsea Ballerini . The Tennessee native had a surprise success story with Rolling Up The Welcome Mat, a personal response to the heartbreaking end of her five-year marriage to Morgan Evans. No one, especially not Ballerini, expected fans to react so strongly to her journal from heartache to healing.
But now, emboldened by Rolling Up The Welcome Mat’s success, which included both a Grammy Awards nomination and a CMT Music Awards nod (for Female Video of the Year for “Penthouse”) and the follow-up Rolling Up The Welcome Mat (For Good), Ballerini is ready to embrace a new chapter in her music. This one, still very authentic, but showing maturity, grace for herself, and what it’s been like to fall in love again, this time with actor Chase Stokes.
“I want to make a record about what it feels to be 30… what it feels like to be falling in love and feeling a new level of safety,” Ballerini tells Flaunt. “Having the space in my life to experience all of it first had to happen for it now to reflect in the music.”
Although influenced by artists of other genres, Ballerini insists her next album will still be country, albeit with her own spin on it. But for the new record, Ballerini is putting together her own team, who happen to all be female.
“I put together my dream group of people that I wanted to make it with and I’m making the whole record with the same people,” Ballerini reveals. “And it’s all women.”
Ballerini has seen her fame skyrocket in recent years. After finding success a decade ago, with her debut “Love Me Like You Mean It” single, the singer-songwriter is happy to share her life with the rest of the world, even if it comes at a personal cost.
“It’d be really unfair of me to be putting out records and putting my personal life on the internet and then be fussy about someone wanting something from me,” Ballerini reflects. “That’s what I’ve signed up for.”
Still, no one is more aware than Ballerini of the slippery slope that comes with being famous. It’s a road she is currently navigating, and likely will be for years to come.
“I don’t have it figured out yet. And I wonder if anyone really ever does,” Ballerini says, adding that she loves that she feels so accessible to her fans.
“That helps me kind of feel a bit safer in the shift of eyeballs and the shift of people wanting to know what’s going on with me,” she adds. “But I also do feel the need to be a little bit more self-preserved than I ever have.”
Ballerini will host the CMT Music Awards for the fourth year in a row, but this time by herself, after sharing duties with Kane Brown for the last three years. The CMT Music Awards will air live on Sunday, April 7, at 8:00 PM ET on CBS.
Find all of Ballerini’s music and upcoming shows at KelseaBallerini.com.