Ashley McBryde is one of country music’s most artful, authentic, and steady voices. She also does things her own way, as evidenced by her new song, “The Devil I Know.”
McBryde chatted about “The Devil I Know” before the TV taping for Toby Keith: American Icon, an all-star tribute to the late Country Music Hall of Fame inductee that will air on Wednesday, August 28, at 9 p.m. ET/PT on NBC. Other performers include Luke Bryan, Eric Church, Carrie Underwood, Jordan Davis, Brantley Gilbert, Jelly Roll, Lainey Wilson, Darius Rucker, and more.
McBryde said she respected Keith for many things but clung to his songwriting. She explained that Keith could make you laugh or cry and make the room fun or somber.
“None of that seemed like a stretch for him,” she said. “It all came really natural. As songwriters, we have to keep each of those parts of us really healthy. Toby was willing to, whatever he was saying or singing, he was willing to stand next to it, no matter if it makes you uncomfortable. That’s something that was really important.”
McBryde’s new song, “The Devil I Know,” was inspired by many of the traits she admired about Keith. She played bars early in her career and often heard that she couldn’t drive her truck between bar gigs because she was a woman. Then, when her shows started getting bigger, people continued to criticize her. They said she drank too much. They picked on her choice of romantic partners. McBryde got sick of other people’s opinions.
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Ashley McBryde: “I’m Like, ‘Well, I Didn’t Ask You’”
“And, I’m like, ‘Well, I didn’t ask you,’” McBryde said. “It doesn’t matter where you are in your life or what your career is. There is always going to be someone that says, ‘You shouldn’t do this. You should do it this way. You shouldn’t be that. You should be this way.’ And I got sick of it.”
She described “The Devil I Know” as a celebration of saying, “You know what? I got me, and if you don’t get it, I didn’t ask you to.”
The fan reaction to the song was so overwhelming that she released a live recording of it and used it as ammunition to convince her record label to let her send it to country radio.
“There’s always discussion surrounding what the next single will be,” she said. I’m like, ‘Listen to the board tape. Do you hear the response to this little finger-picked acoustic riff at the intro? They know that it’s ‘The Devil I Know.’ They consume this song. They embrace this song. Now you get to hear it.”
Photo by Danielle Del Valle/Getty Images
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