Natural Woman
grammy winner Amanda Shires authentically reflects about her life and new album
By Jac Valitchka
Amanda Shires is exactly how you think she will be: thoughtful, honest, funny, and full of candor. She is as wide open as the vast plains of Lubbock, Texas, where she grew up after her parents’ divorce, “learning which snakes were bad.” And make no mistake, the twinges of self-deprecation she shares are actually the secret handshake of someone who knows exactly who they are.
And who is Shires? She is the former 10-year-old who saw a fiddle in a pawn shop window and convinced her daddy to buy it for her. Then, at 15, the fiddle player who toured with the historic Western swing band, the Texas Playboys. She is a multi-instrumentalist, Grammy-winning singer-songwriter and founder of the all-female supergroup, The Highwomen, a painter, and a poet. A mother to her 10-year-old daughter, Mercy. She is also the woman who has written her way out of one of her hardest seasons and is reclaiming her own story apart from her once-shared life with musician (and Mercy’s father) Jason Isbell, who filed for divorce from Shires in 2023.
With the release of her new solo album, Nobody’s Girl, Shires assures us she’s not here to play small—or second fiddle for anyone.
Known for her ruthlessly candid songs, Amanda Shires has come a long way since being named the AMA’s Emerging Artist of the Year in 2017. In addition to her new album out this month, the resilient singer-songwriter performs with The Highwomen, alongside Brandi Carlile, Maren Morris, and Natalie Hemby.
The whole album seems to have far-reaching tentacles beyond your own experience, like a universal touch to the rawest nerve of a soul kind of thing. Has that been the feedback?
Amanda shires: Honestly, I haven’t talked to a whole lot of folks about it. The goal is to name the feelings, and so many of them are loss and grief and trying to figure out how to find strength when you’re at your weakest. I think the universal things, no matter if it’s a marriage or losing a loved one—I’ve lost a few of those too this year—I think that it’s the most amazing thing when you’re going through it, like, ‘I don’t know how much I can take,’ and then you get through it, and you’re like, ‘God dang, I’m f-ing strong.’
Hell, yeah!
AS: And then you find places you didn’t know you were strong, and then you feel empowered to find even more strength and put on your ‘no-I-can’t-yes-I-can-do-it pants,’ even if you don’t want to (laughs).
It had to be a cathartic experience to write this. What else worked for you? Was it getting dressed every day? Taking a shower?
AS: I tried a lot of things, actually. I tried over-imbibing (laughs), but that didn’t work out. And then I tried going to jujutsu class. There’s a difference in being alone and loneliness, and I was sort of confusing the two for a second, and I went over there, and I was pretending I wanted to learn jujutsu, and at the end of the class I was like, ‘Can I just be the person you demonstrate on?’ (laughing) and then I got kicked out. I found a friend group and made some new friends because sometimes you just have to when you’ve gone through something where you’ve separated. People have to get new friends. Then, I used to work out at home, but I’m like: ‘I’m home all the time,’ so I joined the YMCA and started going to the gym.
Nobody’s Girl is out now. Shires will play at The Eastern in Atlanta, GA, on October 29; for more, go to amandashiresmusic.com.
I’m breathing a sigh of relief that you actually do have to work out. You are the girl that all the girls want to be and the men want to be with.
AS: That’s not true if you look at how many dates I’ve gone on! And I have to work out every day. I have to do a lot to make up for the amount of Golden Oreos I eat and the amount of Albanese Gummi Bears I eat.
Has Mercy heard the new album and given you any feedback?
AS: She’s heard it, and she’s heard the songs that didn’t make it. There’s one song that didn’t make it called “Stormbringer,” and she’s pretty PO’d about that, but I told her it’ll go on something. I told her that will be on a different record.
We’ve been blasting [the single] “A Way It Goes” in the house. I can’t get it out of my head. It is just a perfect song.
AS: That’s awesome. I’m not very good at taking compliments, but damn, I appreciate that.
It’s been a little bit of time [since the divorce], and it’s sort of cliché, but really, how are you feeling today?
AS: I feel like it’s in the rearview, but that’s not to say I still don’t find moments—they’re few and far between now—where I feel like I have to cry in the pantry. Not even cry . . . but that used to be what I did . . . it comes in less and less often, the waves. And when they do, they’re not as strong. They’re little ripples. V
Photography by Brett Warren; this story appears in our Fall 2025 issue.
