Recorded with Nick Corson and Duncan Troast (both of Video Age), the record takes the blueprint of classic country music and moulds it into a multitude of different forms, from distorted alt rock to dream pop that’s as steamy and sultry as the Louisiana air of the city they call home. This stylistic diversity is in no small part to Corson and Toast, whose own quirks and signatures come together to accentuate rather than muffle Kirgo’s style. “Nick and Dunan intuitively understood what it was that I was looking for,” Kirgo explains. “They have their own musical languages that they bring in and sprinkle throughout.”

Opener and latest single ‘Spare’ is the perfect introduction. What the label call “a sugar-sweet curveball of vocal runs and tasty bass scales,” the song’s laidback tempo and pliable vocals belie its serious subject matter. Kirgo wrote the track in a moment of converging hardships: the aftermath of a breakup, the death of a close friend and a forced evacuation due to Hurricane Ida. But rather than linger on the pain of loss, she instead focuses on the potential for growth and fresh starts, turning what could’ve been a sad song into something hopeful and empowering.

This sense of empowerment is a recurring theme across the record, as testified by lead single ‘Try Harder’, a song the label describe as “about being a confused young person and trying to do your best in a complex and uncertain world.” Sounding something like a long-lost nineties alt-rock-pop hit, the track packs in plucked acoustic guitar, wistful pedal steel and stabs of brash electric guitar as Kirgo does her best to deal with dashed dreams and grim realities, again striving to find positivity wherever she can. “It’s a pretty simple story,” Kirgo says. “This album was meant to bring me joy and I hope that, when people listen to it, they feel good.”