Kacey Musgraves on 'Golden Hour,' Recording At Sheryl Crow's Studio & More

The Golden Hour is that gorgeous period of time right after the sun rises, or before the sun sets, when the sky is more red/orange -- just golden. It's beautiful, peaceful and serene. But Golden Hour is also the name of country star Kacey Musgraves's brand new album.

Golden Hour is Kacey's fourth full-length studio album and follows her 2016 holiday record A Very Kacey Christmas, as well as 2015's Pageant Material. Kacey's new LP features 13 new songs, including singles "Space Cowboy" and "Butterflies," and was co-written and co-produced with Ian Fitchuk and Daniel Tashian.

Kacey exclusively explains to iHeartRadio of the meaning behind the title of her new album, "The title Golden Hour just seemed to sum up this chapter of my life perfectly. Not only am I from a town called Golden, Texas, but leading up to making this record, there's been a lot of beauty in my atmosphere and in my world, and I love the name. I love the picture that pops in my head when I hear that title. It's also an actual song on the record, but it's just this warm, golden feeling that I'm really happy to have in my life and I found it to be a perfect title for this record."

On Recording At Sheryl Crow's Studio

To make this album even more special, Kacey recorded the music at Sheryl Crow's studio. She explains, she wanted to get away from the "rat race of the music row studio feel" and that her surroundings at Sheryl's place, which also has a horse stable, had helped to spur musical creativity. Kacey tells us:

"We made this record mostly out at Sheryl Crow's amazing studio that she has, and our goal was to really just get away from the rat race of the music row studio feel, which is fine on its own, but it's just not the most inspiring for us. So, she was super gracious in letting us come in and set up a creative home there in her studio, which also happens to be an incredible horse stable and saloon, and it's just got the best vibes on the planet. We really got to take our time and I got to take my time in just exploring lots of different avenues sonically and thematically. I'm really thankful that I did because I'm really proud of this record."

She adds, "I'm a huge horse lover, so getting to come to the studio early in the morning, and get to ride with Sheryl, and just kind of get super charged by nature and all these beautiful animals, and then going in to record at the studio was just an experience like I've never had before."

On the Inspiration behind "Butterfly" & her Favorite Golden Hour Songs

Kacey may have been inspired by her surroundings at Sheryl Crow's studio, but her new songs are inspired by the things that she's experienced over the last year or two -- she did recently get married, after all. She explains, "It's a collection of songs representing some beautiful, positive change in my life, with meeting the right person and getting married. But there's also other aspects of songs on there that represent different other facets of life that inspire me too. Missing my family, figuring out what to do with a touring schedule and coming home and not seeing your friends. There's irreverence and attitude on 'High Horse' about a certain character that we all kind of know. And there's 'Rainbow,' that speaks to anybody with any kind of a weight on their shoulders."

"Butterflies," the second single from Golden Hour, was written right after Kacey met her husband Ruston Kelly. Musgraves tells us, "Butterflies' is one of my favorite songs on the record, and it's actually the first song that I wrote after meeting my now husband. And everything from the lyrics down to the production really represents this floaty, dreamy feeling that I got as soon as he came into my life. I wrote this song with Natalie Hemby and Shane McNally back in 2016 in the spring when I had gotten off the road and tried to get back to my creative roots of just writing again just to write and explore new ideas. I had just met Rustin and my world had been completely flipped upside down. So this is a great sonic representation of that."

One of Kacey's most personal songs on Golden Hour is the very first on the album, "Slow Burn." The country star tells us of the track, "It's a song that I feel like is one of my most personal. It's kind of my most autobiographical, and it's just a really honest peek into where my head is at as a 29-year-old woman in my relationship, and in just in life in general. I talk about my grandma in that song, and how she cried whenever I pierce my nose, which is true. And, the song just gives me a really good laid back, chill feeling, which is how I'm feeling."

Golden Hour is Kacey's fourth full-length record, but this time around, she tells us it feels "different" putting her new body of work out into the world. She explains, "I feel like I've opened up a little bit. I feel like I'm in a different head space. I almost feel like I've come out of this shell that I didn't even really know that I was in before, and I'm really excited to share that mentality with people. We're living in a time that's very polarized. It's very inflamed on all sides of the coin. Everyone's on a soap box and it can be a little bit scary sometimes, just turning on the TV and seeing kind of the state of everything. So instead of focusing on all that, I really wanted to give people almost kind of an escape, like a groovy, vibey escape from all that. We're all so tired of that. And we need beauty right now, we need realness, we need truth, and I really hope that this album brings some joy to everyone."

Kacey will be touring throughout the rest of 2018, on "The Breakers Tour" with Little Big Town and Midland, at Stagecoach, in addition to joining Harry Styles on his summer tour. For a full list of tour dates, head over to Kacey's official website.