Victoria Bailey - A Cowgirl Rides On (2023) [Hi-Res]

In Victoria Bailey’s songs, she carries us over an expansive emotional and musical terrain. We ride with her through the desolation of loss, over the rocky ledges of heartache, across the fields of blossoming wildflowers of new love, and along the plains of promise and new-found faith. Bailey’s vocals ring with an emotional purity that reverberates deeply. Like Emmylou Harris and Dolly Parton, Bailey dwells in her songs, drawing out every note of emotion with her vocal phrasing and musical range.

Like all classic bluegrass and country songs, Bailey’s songs are atmospheric, telling stories of love gone wrong or evoking the memory of a special place or celebrating the joys of a special relationship. On her new album, A Cowgirl Rides On, Bailey travels alongside Harris, Parton, Loretta Lynn, and other classics as she delivers a collection of personal, heartfelt songs that resonate universally. Awash in pedal steel, fiddle, mandolin, banjo, and guitar, the songs on A Cowgirl Rides On create an openness into which Bailey enters with her intimate vocals. “I feel like each song has a little piece of me,” reflects Bailey. “I wanted the record to feel like I sound live.” With this in mind, she and producer Brian Whelan, who also co-wrote some of the songs, recorded the songs live.