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star-crossed Trivia | 50 facts about the new Kacey Musgraves album

“star-crossed” is the fifth studio album by American singer Kacey Musgraves. It was released on Friday 10th, 2021.

So let’s find out some trivia and facts about the new album.

Star-Crossed is the fifth studio album by American singer Kacey Musgraves
The title is stylized in all lowercase
It was released on September 10, 2021, by MCA Nashville and Interscope Records
Musgraves co-wrote and co-produced the album with American musicians Ian Fitchuk and Daniel Tashian
With whom she collaborated on her fourth studio album, Golden Hour (2018), as well
The album’s subject matter was inspired by Musgraves’ personal journey of heartache and healing following her divorce from American singer-songwriter Ruston Kelly
She described Star-Crossed as chronicling a “modern tragedy”
Taking influences from Romeo and Juliet, the famous play by English playwright William Shakespeare
She cited Bill Withers, Daft Punk, Sade, Eagles, and Weezer as her musical references for the album
Sonically, Star-Crossed is a pop record incorporating folk, dance, rock, and psychedelic elements, while retaining the country sensibility of its predecessor
It consists of mellow ballads, propelled by steady tempos, analog synthesizers, looped drums, and layered harmonies
Two singles were released in promotion of the album
The lead single and title track “Star-Crossed” on August 23, 2021, followed by “Justified” four days later
An accompanying film titled after the album and featuring its music, directed by Bardia Zeinali
It was exclusively released to Paramount+ alongside the album’s release
Star-Crossed received generally favourable reviews from music critics
They regarded it the “divorce album” of Musgraves’ discography
In contrast to the celebration of marriage and a life partner in Golden Hour
Most of the reviews complimented the genre-blending production and Musgraves’ intimate storytelling
While the rest called the songwriting weak and dubbed it an inferior work to Golden Hour
In March 2018, American singer-songwriter Kacey Musgraves released her fourth studio album, Golden Hour, which received widespread critical acclaim and won in all four of its nominated categories at the 61st Grammy Awards, including Album of the Year and Best Country Album
It debuted at number four on the US Billboard 200 chart and at number one on the Top Country Albums chart
To support the album, Musgraves embarked on two concert tours: the Oh, What a World: Tour and the Oh, What a World: Tour II
In March 2021, Musgraves was featured on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine
In the cover story, she delves into self-care and the personal work she has done during the COVID-19 pandemic
Musgraves also revealed that as of January 2021, she had written 39 songs for the project
She’s once again working with Golden Hour co-producers Ian Fitchuk and Daniel Tashian
In April 2021, it was reported that the album will be released via Interscope Records and UMG Nashville
In May, during a cover story for Elle magazine, Musgraves revealed that the album sees her tackling her divorce from country singer Ruston Kelly after two and a half years of marriage
The two were married in October 2017 and filed for divorce in July 2020
Musgraves also revealed that the record contains 15 of the now 40 songs she wrote during the pandemic
In August 2021, during a cover story for Crack Magazine, it was revealed that the project will be released before the end of the year, features jazz flute and a kato, and will have “more of a foot in country than Golden Hour”
During an appearance on Dr. Maya Shankar’s podcast A Slight Change of Plans, Musgraves sang snippets of two of the songs from the album, “Camera Roll” and “Angel”
On August 21, to celebrate her birthday, Kacey shared a snippet of the title track, which was released as the lead single two days later
The album was recorded in Nashville in early 2021, in under three weeks
In an interview with Zane Lowe on Apple Music, Musgraves elaborated on what to expect sonically from the album, noting that although the album will be more country than Golden Hour, it will be combined with more musical influences
Musgraves cited Bill Withers, Daft Punk, Sade, Eagles, and Weezer as inspirations for the album
Regarding her status as country musician, she said “I feel like I don’t belong to country in any way on one hand, but on the other hand, I’m deeply rooted in that genre. So I’m not owned by it”
The album’s lyrics were conceived by Musgraves following her divorce from Kelly
In the Rolling Stone interview, the singer explained that as she was conceptualizing the album earlier this year, she kept coming back to Greek tragedies, and their three-act structure
The album is also inspired by William Shakespeare’s popular tragedy Romeo and Juliet
Star-Crossed was released on September 10, 2021
On August 23, 2021, Musgraves announced that her fifth album will be called Star-Crossed and revealed the release date
On the same day, she revealed the track list across her social media
On August 23, 2021, Musgraves posted a trailer across her social media for a 50-minute companion film, titled after the album
The film was launched exclusively on Paramount+ the same day the album was released, September 10, 2021
The film, characterized as having “a sense of heightened reality”, was directed by Bardia Zeinali from a concept by Musgraves and Zeinali, and shot by a cinematographer Matthew Libatique
The film was shot over 10 days in Los Angeles and features cameo appearances by actor Eugene Levy, RuPaul’s Drag Race winner Symone, rapper Princess Nokia, actor Victoria Pedretti, and comedian Meg Stalter
Upon release, Star-Crossed was met with generally positive reviews from music critics
On Metacritic, which assigns a normalized score out of 100 to ratings from publications, the album received a weighted mean score of 77 based on 15 critics, indicating “generally favourable reviews”