Miranda Lambert Reveals the Story Behind ‘The Marfa Tapes’
In 2021, Miranda Lambert, Jack Ingram, and Jon Randall released a collaborative studio album together called The Marfa Tapes. At the 2022 Grammy Awards, The Marfa Tapes was nominated for Best Country Album. In an interview with Music Connection, Lambert explained how The Marfa Tapes came to be.
Miranda Lambert loved working on ‘The Marfa Tapes’
Lambert, Ingram, and Randall have written songs together since 2015. The Marfa Tapes has a stripped-down production, and it was released with the purpose of sounding as unprocessed as possible.
In an interview with Music Connection, Lambert explained how she came to release The Marfa Tapes with Ingram and Randall.
“That’s one of my favorite projects I’ve ever worked on. It was so organic, the way it came together, Jack, Jon, and I spent seven years writing songs, and they are such great friends of mine. Two Septembers ago, it was like ‘So what are we going to do with these songs? They are just sitting there, and they will never see the light of day,'” Lambert explained.
She continued, “We just had the harebrained idea to record them and put them out recorded in one take on one microphone. Once we got into it, it was a lot more in depth than I thought emotionally. We had lived with these songs for so long, and I was just happy to put them down in a recording.”
Miranda Lambert thinks the film of ‘The Marfa Tapes’ can be ‘scary’
In addition to the recorded album, there is also a film of the album that was released. For The Marfa Tapes film, Lambert, Ingram, and Randall perform together and also discuss the making of the album in interviews.
“We had a videographer there to get some B-roll, I thought. Spencer Peeples made this beautiful film. So, a film and a double record: we didn’t know what we were getting into. It’s one of my favorite things. There is nowhere to hide. And it’s not every day that the fans get to hear the actual way that the song starts, and how raw and how scary that can be,” Lambert explained to Music Connection.
She continued, “I will always say forever that this is one of my favorite things that I have ever been a part of.”
Some songs from ‘The Marfa Tapes’ are on ‘Palomino’
In April 2022, Lambert released her ninth studio album, Palomino. The album includes multiple songs from The Marfa Tapes including “In His Arms,” “Geraldene,” and “Waxahachie.”
Speaking with Music Connection, Lambert discussed her love of the song “Waxahachie” and its opening line.
“I feel like that, too—it sets the whole scene. You know so much about this girl before you hear another word,” Lambert said. “To me, the first line in a song is one of the most important, because you’ve got to set it up. I want to write some of those first lines that make you want to start over listening because you weren’t paying enough attention and you don’t want to miss part of the story.”
