Lola Kirke - Trailblazer

“Ain’t that just the way that it goes, oh baby?,” Lola Kirke ponders on the opening track of her new album as she looks back on a montage of her myriad life choices.

In a sleepy siren song, she rifles through empty possibilities. These wonderings, these what-ifs and could’ve-beens that thankfully never were, seem to form the backbone of Trailblazer, an album that argues through all the missteps, false starts and wrong turns, a path can be forged in their wake.

Trailblazer came to be during a season of ink stains and stage blood as the multi-hyphenate star wrote her memoir, Wild West Village, and starred in Ryan Coogler’s upcoming thriller, Sinners. In reality, though, this album has been decades in the making.

From the tip-toeing opener to the proudly strutting closing tune, ‘Bury Me in New York City,’ the 10-track collection maps Kirke’s unconventional journey, not just to country music, but toward becoming her most authentic self.

With the help of some of Nashville’s finest, including songwriters Natalie Hemby and Ashley Monroe, as well as acclaimed producer Daniel Tashian, the artist fearlessly dissected her life so far – her upbringing, her familial relationships and the pivotal moments that have molded her into the person she is today. All airs are set aside for this release – the collection is far less campy than last year’s Country Curious EP – and Kirke, fully trusting her instincts, is able to truly shine.

While Trailblazer is, at times, an agonizing voyage – littered with neon-shrouded waltzes navigating heartache like the hypnotizing ‘241s’ and plucky two-steps through trauma like the Heartbreakers-esque ‘Raised By Wolves’ –  it’s an honest one. Along the way, listeners are forced to face the phantom love of an absent father (‘Zeppelin III’) and confront an unorthodox cult of motherhood (‘Marlboro Lights & Madonna’). The music holds a lighter to our flimsy notions of the people who make us, attempting to right the past with forgiveness and understanding.

In this way, the album is ultimately a comfort. Audiences get to bask in the easy joys of sibling ties (‘Mississippi, My Sister, Elvis & Me’), hoist a middle finger to societal pressures (‘2 Damn Sexy’) and find solace in knowing they’re never too far gone (‘Easy On You’). It’s a revelation, an exercise in letting go and letting be; and in between its sturdy proverbs, born from a lifetime spent trying to figure it all out, an essential country album has been allowed to naturally unfold.

Trailblazer is beautifully revealing, one song after the other exposing the heart of one of modern country music’s greatest outliers, shit show and all. But hey, ain’t that just the way that it goes?

9/10

Lola Kirke’s 2025 project, Trailblazer, is available everywhere March 21 via One Riot Records.

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