Is Miranda Lambert our last great female country star? Since her 2001 self-titled debut, she has stayed true-blue to the genre, never veering into crossover territory. Partial credit goes to her beaut of an East Texas twang, which she doesn't try to flatten into something it's not. On her ninth studio album, Lambert plays around with rock 'n' roll and blues, but it's also so country. "I'm out in the Mojave, call me Ricky, call me Bobby," she dares on the muscular "Actin' Up," like a modern-day Jerry Reed. "Call me hotter than wasabi/ Cause I'm actin' up." Three of these songs were first heard on The Marfa Tapes, her acoustic, raw-to-the-bone 2021 collaboration with singer-songwriters Jon Randall and Jack Ingram. "In His Arms" gets a richer, rounder studio treatment, and "Waxahachie" is filled out with cool '80s guitar. "Geraldene" is even more of a hoot, alive with juke-joint fire and Keith Richards-style guitar. Outlaw fun in the tradition of Loretta Lynn's "You Ain't Woman Enough," it finds Lambert confidently stuttering the title as she delivers devastating couplets: "I could see you coming all the way from Amarillo/ Truck stop red lips pullin' on some nicotine/ Shining like the spoke on a brand new El Dorado/ You're trailer park pretty, but you're never gonna be Jolene." The singer also pulls out an unexpected, faithful cover of Mick Jagger's "Wandering Spirit," turning the rockabilly flair up to 11. "Strange" is an instant classic vibrant with Fleetwood Mac vibes, while "Country Money" has a cool '70s AOR feel—complete with Joe Walsh-esque guitar—and a winking storyline about getting rich without getting fancy: "Connie Johnson got a farm in Wisconsin and a diesel in the drive … and the best beef in the cheese state, baby"; "Carol Jean, she's the chicken-egg queen ... drives her hens around town in a Coupé de Ville." There's a Gene Autry lope to "If I Was a Cowboy," along with a modern-day attitude: "So mamas, if your daughters grow up to be cowboys, so what?" "Carousel" is an acoustic stunner with a tender music-box melody and a storyline full of rich symbolism—about "pretty Elena," who has a secret past life, her heart having been broken by a big-top man. "She walked the high wire back in the '80s … hanging from the top tent rafters 'til the spotlight disappeared… The way he earned her trust was on a 20-foot trapeze/ She fell so hard because he always let her fly/ 'Til he left her heart suspended in a cotton-candy sky." And "Music City Queen" might not hold up for a future "Best Of" record, but it's fun right now. Swirling in swamp-blues guitar, it features the B-52's on backing vocals—including Fred Schneider doing a kitsch call-and-response—and witty lines (about a river boat!) like "She's had the same red carpet since '79 and she was 'ah, ah, stayin' alive.'" But this is not Lambert going pop; it's the B-52's bending to her will.
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