Lainey Wilson on Her Semi-Autobiographical ‘Heart Like a Truck’
Lainey Wilson says she's dang proud of her hardened heart, and she hopes when fans hear her new single "Heart Like a Truck," they'll find the strength to show their own scars and bruises.
The new song is a mid-tempo statement piece that becomes a beautiful, symphonic catharsis before it wraps. It's not a sad song, per se — actually, Wilson tells Taste of Country Nights she thinks of it as more of what's to come than what's haunting her memory.
"I don't even think it has to be a breakup," Wilson shares of the lyric, admitting they're semi-autobiographical. Trannie Anderson and Dallas Wilson helped round it out, and Jay Joyce produced.
"I could sit here and tell you sob stories all day about my life and moments where I was living in a camper trailer and things were falling down all around me and people were passing away. It was just complete ... it was just hurt."
There's a poignancy to "Heart Like a Truck" that fans will recognize from "Things a Man Oughta Know," another song that mixed emotions in familiar ways. Wilson admits she's been a heart breaker and had her heart broken, but she stays optimistic that there is someone out there who will be patient enough to deal with the demands on her time (when asked directly, she shrugged away a relationship question). But if a romance starts and stops abruptly, that's okay, too.
"There were definitely times in my life where I was okay with getting broken up with, where I was okay with my heart hurting because I was getting the kind of songs that I needed," the ACM New Female Artist of the Year winner says.
After "Things a Man Oughta Know" and "Never Say Never" with Cole Swindell hit No. 1 on Billboard Country Airplay charts, Wilson admits she's feeling the pressure to repeat. Mostly though, she's keeping her head down with tour dates and many more new songs to follow "Heart Like a Truck." She's deep into making her second album, admitting she's hoping for another collaboration, but will need to hear mixes of certain songs before deciding.