This summer finds Maren Morris joining the ranks of country music’s major headliners, as she headlines outdoor amphitheaters and other large venues for the first time in her career.
Despite taking this step up, Morris says in some ways, she’s scaled back on the visual bells and whistles in her show. This might come as a surprise given that for many artists, the larger the venue, the bigger the spectacle.
“On my last tour, even though I was in smaller venues, I feel like the production was more over the top compared to this summer tour,” Morris said in an early May Zoom interview. “On my last tour, we had a video wall and an elevator and steps with lights all over them and fog and bubbles. So yeah, in some ways, I feel like this one is really stripping it back. It’s definitely bigger, but it’s not as splashy as the last tour production.”
Credit: Harper Smith
Credit: Harper Smith
Indeed, the more relaxed and organic sound of Morris’ new album, “Humble Quest,” coupled with the emotional story telling of the lyrics, seems to call for a show that puts the focus on the songs themselves.
The slightly twangy mid-tempo tune “I Can’t Love You Anymore” (one of several co-writes on the album with husband and fellow country star Ryan Hurd), is a tale of lasting love that ironically enough, was written after the couple had an argument, while on the delicate “Hummingbird” she sings the praises of motherhood. On the frisky pop-ish tune “Circles Around This Town,” Morris recounts the long path to success (more on that later) and how she remains driven to make meaningful music, while she shows her lighter side on “Tall Guys,” a sweet and sprightly tune about the appeal of guys who possess considerable verticality in their height.
“Humble Quest” was born out of a period that included some major life events for Morris, as well as her husband. In 2019, she was rocked by the death of Busbee, the highly successful songwriter who had produced Morris’ first two albums — and had become a good friend of both Morris and Hurd.
In March 2020, literally as COVID-19 was hitting and hospitals were getting crowded with infected patients, Morris gave birth to the couple’s first child, a son named Hayes. But with the joy came a bout with postpartum depression that Morris has said lasted six months.
Then, of course, there was the pandemic itself, which meant Morris couldn’t tour and threw the future of what a music career might look like into question. With music on hold, she felt like she had lost a chunk of her purpose in life.
The one thing Morris could still hang onto was writing songs and making records. And at one point she was driving around Nashville and the words humble quest popped into her head. She was struck by the phrase, but wasn’t sure what it meant. But as she wrote the remaining songs, she felt it encompassed the stories on the album and described her journey in life and music.
“It’s this never-ending circle,” Morris said. “There’s no linear start and finish. Your life is just memories upon memories and learning from mistakes and growing and getting humbled along the way.”
Morris knows a few things about being humbled. Far from being an overnight success, she spent more than 10 years touring around her home state of Texas, self-releasing three albums and trying out for virtually every television talent show she could — including “The Voice,” “American Idol,” “America’s Got Talent” and “Nashville Star” — and being rejected by every one of them. Yet she never let go of her dream of a career in country music.
Things finally began to turn when Morris moved to Nashville, where she got songs recorded by the likes of Tim McGraw and Kelly Clarkson. She self-released a self-titled EP in 2015 and saw it amass 2.5 million streams in just one month. Columbia Nashville then signed Morris, re-released the EP and saw its single, “My Church” go top five on Billboard magazine’s country songs chart.
The hits have kept coming, as her first two albums — 2016′s “Hero” and 2019′s “Girl” — gave her three chart-topping singles. Along the way, she saw her duet with electronic superstar Zedd on the 2018 song “In The Middle” become a crossover smash and she joined Brandi Carlile, Amanda Shires and Natalie Hemby to form the supergroup the Highwomen.
Now comes “Humble Quest,” whose lead single, “Circles Around This Town,” has already cracked the top 10 on Billboard’s country songs chart. Morris is looking forward to sharing as much of her music as possible as she enjoys her first outing as a full-fledged amphitheater headliner.
“It’s the longest show that I’ve done thus far, so we’re trying to cram as much in there as we can,” Morris said. “We’re obviously playing a lot of the new record, but yeah, it’s like weaving in and out (with) old familiar songs that are old favorites and my favorites, too. I feel like it’s a pretty well rounded show.”
CONCERT PREVIEW
Maren Morris
8 p.m. June 18. $35-$89.75. Ameris Bank Amphitheatre, 2200 Encore Parkway, Alpharetta. concerts.livenation.com.
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