Settling Down

Album: Wildcard (2019)
Charted: 41
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • Miranda Lambert first met New York City Police Department officer Brendan Mcloughlin in late 2018 when she was in the Big Apple promoting the Pistol Annies' third album and he was on security detail. They quietly struck up a relationship.

    This pensive, mid-tempo acoustic track finds Lambert reflecting on her newfound romance and how settling down with her boyfriend might affect her life. "I always have an itch to find a new adventure, but I'm also always ready to walk through my front door," Lambert explained in a press release.

    Lambert and McLoughlin got married on January 26, 2019 in Davidson County, Tennessee.
  • Lambert wrote the song with Luke Dick and Natalie Hemby shortly after getting hitched to Mcloughlin. The same trio also penned her "Bluebird" hit single.
  • I'm a wild child and a homing pigeon
    Caravan and an empty kitchen
    Bare feet on the tile with my head up in the clouds
    I'm one heart goin' both directions
    One love and a couple of questions
    Am I settlin' up or settlin' down?


    Lambert has always felt being torn between a wanderer and a homemaker, and her mom used to call her "a wild child and a homing pigeon." The singer already had her "wild child and a homing pigeon" hook when she arrived at the songwriting session with Hemby and Dick. She mentioned her idea to the pair, and it led them to a conversation about how a well-lived life usually requires balancing the two feelings.

    "This song is full of paradoxes of wanting to do two things that don't necessarily jive, wanting to do two things that are a little bit at odds with one another," Dick told Billboard. "You want to be a troubadour, playing from town to town, but you want to wake up in your own house and make your own breakfast and be with the people that you love every day. The life of the artist is much more of a whirlwind than most people's. But artists are still people too, and everybody wants those roots."
  • Trey Fanjoy directed the video, which shows Miranda Lambert and Brendan McLoughlin at home on their farm in Nashville. Lambert's horse, Gibson, and rescue dog, Delta Dawn, also make appearances.

    Lambert told radio.com's Kelly Ford this was her first ever video with a love interest. "I'm like, 'you're cute, you're here, and you're free,'" she joked. "It was fun; he did such a great job... and our little dog is in it, and our ponies. It's at my magical-happy place an hour away from Nashville."

Comments

Be the first to comment...

Editor's Picks

Wedding Bell Blues

Wedding Bell BluesSong Writing

When a song describes a wedding, it's rarely something to celebrate - with one big exception.

Rickie Lee Jones

Rickie Lee JonesSongwriter Interviews

Rickie Lee Jones on songwriting, social media, and how she's handling Trump.

Sarah Brightman

Sarah BrightmanSongwriter Interviews

One of the most popular classical vocalists in the land is lining up a trip to space, which is the inspiration for many of her songs.

Bill Medley of The Righteous Brothers

Bill Medley of The Righteous BrothersSongwriter Interviews

Medley looks back on "Unchained Melody" and "You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'" - his huge hits from the '60s that were later revived in movies.

Bill Withers

Bill WithersSongwriter Interviews

Soul music legend Bill Withers on how life experience and the company you keep leads to classic songs like "Lean On Me."

The Police

The PoliceFact or Fiction

Do their first three albums have French titles? Is "De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da" really meaningless? See if you can tell in this Fact or Fiction.