Carly Pearce on ‘Honest Woman,’ success and the legacy of Dolly Parton

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On Carly Pearce’s ballad Happy for Myself, the singer recounts what should have been a fairly benign experience for the Kentucky-bred country-pop artist.

A friend who was about to be married asked her to tag along to a jewelry store to help pick out a ring. In the song, which Pearce says chronicles the experience “word-for-word,” the narrator helps her friend and then goes to her car to cry.

“I felt very excited for her but at the same time felt very jealous of her,” says Pearce, in an interview with Postmedia a week before her two-night run at Toronto’s Opera House. “She is a lot younger than me and hasn’t experienced some of the things I’ve experienced in my life and I just wrestled with this moment of ‘Wow, I’m so happy for her, but when is it going to be my time?'”

It is a recurring theme in Pearce’s aptly named fifth album, Honest Woman. The artist has never shied away from mining her life for material. Her 2021 breakthrough third album 29: Written in Stone was an unabashed “divorce” record that was directly inspired by her quick divorce after a painful eight-month marriage to fellow songwriter Michael Ray. That album turned her into a Grammy-winning superstar, while the tumultuous details of her private life that inspired it also made her tabloid fodder.

But that didn’t stop her from offering more heartbreak songs on its 2024 follow-up, Hummingbird, which was an album about healing after the derailed marriage. When it came to writing and collecting songs for Honest Woman, Pearce again found a theme.

“I think I was really getting caught up with success and getting caught up in all of the different stereotypes and comparing myself to people and thinking I was too old to find X, Y and Z and all these different things,” she says.

“I had to go back and remind myself of who I was. I was also having a lot of struggles with feeling the ups and the downs of the music industry and realizing at the end of the day I can only control the music that I create and being proud of that and going back and returning to those roots and finding that girl again.”

‘Success is hard in any capacity’

Opening track, Dream Come True, is another vulnerable ballad that is about a topic that is perhaps not often explored in country-pop songs, which is the downside of finding success and the loneliness that can come from a life in the spotlight. She has a four-bedroom house at the end of a cul-de-sac but can’t attend her best friend’s wedding due to career demands.

“A million girls would love to wear your shoes,” she sings, but reveals how touring makes it hard for her to visit her mother, who was so supportive of her early career but is now sick and can rarely make it out to shows.

“Success is hard in any capacity,” Pearce says. “As I’ve had high highs and low lows, I think it has made me question some different things, and made me wonder if I’d missed out on some things. I think the grass is always greener on the other side, right? I definitely wanted to put my heart out there because there are a lot of sacrifices that nobody sees that you have to put into chasing a dream.”

In the process of returning to her roots and “finding that girl again,” Pearce also revisits other aspects of her past. Musically, the record marks a bit of a return to her bluegrass beginnings in Kentucky, a genre she was attracted to from an early age.

The album also offers some of the hallmarks Pearce has been known for, including salty songs about standing up to men who have done her wrong or don’t measure up to her standards.

Riley Green joins Pearce on If I Don’t Leave I’m Gonna Stay, a sultry ballad about heartache, regret and late-night temptation.

Meeting Dolly Parton ‘crazy and surreal’

Growing up in Kentucky, Pearce sang in church and tent revival concerts as a child and was performing professionally with bluegrass bands by the age of 11. At 16, she left high school to take a job as a singer at Dollywood in Tennessee.

She met Dolly Parton not long after arriving, although she admits it was “crazy and surreal. I don’t think I spoke to her because I was so nervous and couldn’t believe I was in her presence.”

They eventually formed a close bond. In June 2021, Parton surprised Pearce during what she thought was a promotional video for Dollywood by officially inviting her to become a part of the Grand Ole Opry. Pearce was the only person Parton invited to join. Parton died Aug. 25 and Pearce returned to the Opry four days later to perform a tribute to her idol.

“I think she was the best to ever do it,” Pearce says. “She created this culture where you smile when you think of her. That’s just such a beautiful thing. She continually was trying to raise the bar and do more and give more and be more. To me, if you can even just a fraction of what she was, then you are doing something right.”

Carly Pearce will play the Opera House Oct. 15 and 16. Doors open at 7 p.m.

evolmers@postmedia.com

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