Maren Morris says the COVID-19 pandemic helped shape her perspective on her place in country music.
In an interview with Pitchfork, Maren reveals that she was “relieved” her RSVP: The Tour got cancelled due to the pandemic in 2020 and 2021. She says the forced downtime allowed her to put life, and how she creates, into perspective.
“That perpetual growing insecurity of knowing my place in country music,” she replies in response to what she’s stopped worrying about since the onset of the pandemic. “Even though I’ve been successful over the years, I still feel like this middle child in a lot of ways. I’m not really new anymore—I’m established. I’m not country enough for the super-country folks, and I’m too country for the pop folks. But I was forced to stop for two years and think about, like, ‘who gives a f**?'”
Maren says the challenging experience of the pandemic also taught her to not take herself “so seriously,” a mindset that influenced her new album, Humble Quest.
“That’s why this album is titled the way it is. All my plans, all the things that I mapped out—even my pregnancy—it’s just so idiotic to think that I could snap back in two months and go tour again,” she continues. “I realized I’m not in control. It sounds cliché but I’ve taken stock of the things I actually care about. Motherhood sharpened a lot of that for me. Not having a crowd every night sharpened that for me.”
Maren will return to the road when the Humble Quest Tour launches in June.
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