On 'Hummingbird', Carly Pearce Pokes Fun At Things That Once Kept Her 'In Bed For Days’

Hummingbirds. Gorgeous, colourful little birds that we can only assume to be packed with personality.

In many Indigenous American cultures, hummingbirds symbolise love, joy, and beauty associated with the sun and its healing energy. In addition to the symbols they bring to the world, hummingbirds are revered as messengers between the physical and spirit worlds.

So, the title of Carly Pearce’s latest album, hummingbird, couldn’t be more fitting. An album she’s described as “a deeply personal journey filled with heart, soul, and a good dose of humour,” hummingbird finds Pearce “reconstructing the way I see love and the way I see myself.”

The album tracks heartbreak, finding new love, and gaining confidence. Pearce hopes that her latest outing will resonate with anyone “on a healing journey,” proving that things can look up again through vulnerability, self-discovery, and therapy.

“It's okay not to have everything figured out; happiness can be found in the process,” she adds. “I hope hummingbird resonates with everyone who listens and inspires you to find strength in your own journey.”

Pearce tells Countrytown that she “found comfort in healing” amidst the making of hummingbird.

“I found such peace in the idea that a hummingbird shows healing to a lot of people and symbolises that good luck is on the way,” she reveals. “That felt like the essence of this entire album to me. I found that to be such a positive thought as I was putting this album together, wrapping it in a bow, and figuring out how to release it into the world.”

Her fourth album, hummingbird is the highly anticipated follow-up to 2021’s 29: Written In Stone, which came after her self-titled album (released in 2020), and Every Little Thing (2017). Pearce remains the young woman who left her Kentucky home and high school at age 16 to take a job at Dollywood: bright, fun, ambitious, and honouring the classics of country music.

When Countrytown catches up with Pearce, it’s a little under two months since she revealed her diagnosis of the heart condition pericarditis.

A condition that involves the inflammation of the pericardium, the thin, double-layered membrane around the heart, pericarditis is marked by sharp chest pain that worsens when lying down or breathing in—the latter likely challenging for Pearce, as singers require breathing exercises and techniques.

Other symptoms of pericarditis could include fever, muscle aches and pains, heart palpitations, shortness of breath, fatigue, nausea, dry cough, and swelling around the legs or abdomen.

How has she been doing since sharing the news back in late May? “I'm doing really good! I'm slowly, every day, getting a little better,” Pearce declares, sharing that she’s been “tapering off my medicine” and adding a bit of physical activity normalcy to her days.

Describing the last few months as an “interesting time,” Pearce says she had to scale back her physical activity—something she certainly didn’t want to do if she could help it. “If anybody knows me, they know that physical activity is my kryptonite,” she laughs, “and I've really had to change some things about how I handle stress and all those things.

“I wanted to be honest with people, obviously, for people that were coming to see my shows, because they do look a little bit different now, but also just to hopefully raise awareness for anybody who is putting off that doctor's appointment or isn't feeling right or ignoring something that your body's telling you.

“I'm a pretty young, healthy person, and this happened to me, and I think it's important to use my platform for all kinds of things. And, so, the short answer is, I'm doing good, but I'm looking forward to being 100% hopefully in the next couple of months.”

Onto another album cycle. 29: Written In Stone was a successful album for Pearce. It received critical acclaim and charted high on the US and UK Country Albums Charts.

However, it primarily included “one story that I was living at that time,” Pearce notes—complex emotions surrounding her divorce from fellow country singer Michael Ray and the loss of her friend and producer, Busbee—feeling that it was necessary to share more of what she has to offer on hummingbird.

“I feel like people attached one story to me, and it was really important to me to make sure that people saw that there were more sides to me and more pieces to my story,” Pearce says.

“It was very fun to get to play on all the different emotions and all the different life experiences that have happened to me in this album and put on, you know, parts that were humorous and parts that were sassy and parts that were reflective and parts that were sad. It's been really nice to showcase all of those for this album.”

Hummingbird saw Pearce reunite with longtime collaborators Shane McAnally and Josh Osborne and, notably, contained a huge first for the truck on fire singer: she made her debut as a co-producer.

Since Pearce wrote all the songs on hummingbird and has always been interested in production, it just made sense for her to jump on board as co-producer. And the album doesn’t sound unpolished; if anything, it’s the opposite, sounding lush and lived-in and natural, just like Pearce’s songs.

“I really enjoyed the production side of things and putting the sonic side of my brain to the test in the studio,” Pearce smiles. “It was such a fun experience, and I feel like so much of me is all over the way this record sounds.”

Speaking of the record’s sound, there’s just one duet on hummingbird, and it’s a stunner. For we don’t fight anymore, Pearce linked up with the raspy-voiced superstar Chris Stapleton for “one of my proudest moments as a songwriter and as an artist.”

She continues, “I think he's one of the greatest singers of all time, and I've always been so blown away by his gift, and he's been my dream collaboration for years.

“I wrote this song and didn't think it was supposed to be a duet at all. I wrote it for myself, but when I heard the demo back, I heard him singing on it, so I DMed his wife Morgane [Stapleton] on Instagram and asked her if she would play this song for him. And here we are.”

Admitting that that was the first time she sent a direct message via Instagram to secure a collab, Pearce recalls Morgane telling her that Chris gets asked to work with numerous artists and wanted to know if it was okay for him to be honest if he didn’t feel like it was the right fit.

“I said, ‘Totally, I just want him to hear it,’” Pearce shares. “He has been so kind through this song, and obviously, it spoke to him in a certain way, and he's just such a kind, gracious person.

“I joke and say he has no idea how good he is, and if he did, his head couldn't fit through the door because he's so brilliant [laughs], but he's been really complimentary. There’s something that we both get about each other's voices, and I think that really spoke to him in that way.”

So far, hummingbird has been well-received by fans and critics. Pearce said her fans are “happy I finally put out new music” and “excited for this new chapter.”

“I think there's a song on there for everybody,” she says. “I've always been somebody that wanted to write music that meant something, and I think I continue to do that, and that's what makes me proud.”

Pearce is especially proud of soundtracking her healing journey to music and hints at additional plans for hummingbird, including a forthcoming tour of Europe and the UK in 2025. How Pearce knew the album was showcasing her healing journey? When she was able to laugh at herself.

She explains, “I’m able to poke fun at certain things that have happened in my life that once put me in bed for days. I think that's a really fun, empowering place to be.

“Also, I'm standing here going, ‘Hello, I'm still not married. I still haven't figured it out.’ I still am, in a lot of ways, feeling behind my friends or what society says a 34-year-old should be, but I'm living my best life, and that's okay.

“I want to be that girl for girls who feel like, ‘Where's my guy? Am I behind? Am I okay? Is it okay to not have it all figured out?’ I think it's really important, so I feel really empowered by that.”

Carly Pearce’s new album, hummingbird, is out now via Big Machine Records.