Ashley McBryde

Ashley McBryde is a vocalist and songwriter with a touch of rock & roll swagger, a honky tonk heart, and a lyrical voice that puts a modern-day spin on classic country themes. After self-releasing an eponymous album in 2006, she relocated from Arkansas to Nashville, spending the next decade slugging it out before her 2016 EP Jalopies & Expensive Guitars caught the attention of Eric Church. Soon, she signed to Warner Nashville and released her debut full-length, Girl Going Nowhere, an acclaimed 2018 album that helped her win New Female Vocalist from the major country academies and two Grammy nominations. McBryde’s tough, heartfelt country continued to gain momentum with 2020’s Never Will, which generated the country Top 40 hit “One Night Standards.” With her 2022 concept album Ashley McBryde Presents: Lindeville — a cameo-filled collection of stories from a small town — the singer/songwriter demonstrated wit and ambition with few parallels in modern Nashville.

Hailing from Mammoth Spring, Arkansas, McBryde first displayed her interest in music when she was three years old and tried to play her father’s guitar. After repeatedly telling young Ashley to leave the instrument alone, her parents decided the best solution was to get her a guitar of her own. After learning to play, McBryde stuck with the guitar, and at 17 she wrote her first song. Initially, she was shy about sharing her work, and it wasn’t until she enrolled at Arkansas State University (where she played in the marching band) that she began performing her songs for people outside her immediate family.