The new album ‘Deeper Well’ by Kacey Musgraves was announced on Instagram with a photograph of her naked in a field in Iceland. A little cheeky nod to naturism and her love of grass for sure, but equally it read like a metaphor for new beginnings and rebirth.
When title track ‘Deeper Well’ dropped on Thursday you could sense the relief in the fan base. Kacey was back. The glossy, stilted and sometimes cold pop version of Kacey which we got on Star-Crossed has gone. ‘Deeper Well’ has the acoustic guitars and wry self-deprecating lyrics that made us love Kacey in the first place.
It’s not exactly country music though, that’s the truth. She’s stuck with her Golden Hour producers, rather than going back to the sound of her first two albums. When she got into the debacle with the Grammys you wondered if maybe she would come back with something that was an undeniable country song, but that hasn’t proved to be the case. Working with Zach Bryan again made people think this could be a stripped back folk record, but on first listen that doesn’t seem likely for the album either. ‘Deeper Well’ is under-stated, but there’s a still a shimmer to the production.
What’s true is that she sounds more like herself again.
In the video she’s in Iceland, where the clouds are murky, the sea is a vast nothingness of gloom, the rain and wind look relentless. She’s in a cabin, hanging out with goats, farming, putting her clothes out on the line, getting back to nature.
Still it’s not all Earth Mother stuff. Rocks are flying through the air. She seems to be tripping in some moss at one point. And her face still looks like she’s ready for a glamorous party at any moment.
The end of the video then signals the direction this era might take. She stands on a cliff edge, lifts her hands up to a ball of light. Soon she absorbs the energy, becoming a glowing, otherworldly goddess of the sun. She’s been to the mountain, found she can’t hide her power under a rock.
From the ‘Deeper Well’ she’s found her own light and brought it to us. I can’t wait to hear what comes next.
And I know I said I wasn’t buying any new vinyl but I think I’m going to have to make an exception. Somethings are just too perfect to resist:
Highway Queens 
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