The ‘Bell Bottom Country’ Meaning Behind Lainey Wilson’s 2021 Song “Rolling Stone”

Lainey Wilson was already enraptured in Bell Bottom Country music well before her breakthrough 2022 album of the same name hit. On Wilson’s third album Sayin’ What I’m Thinkin’ from 2021, which just made the Top 40 on the Country chart, she earned a hit with the single “Things a Man Oughta Know,” which went to No. 3 on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart.

Also within the album was the slower brooding “Rolling Stone,” a sultrier ballad, capturing some of Wilson’s Bell Bottom country music.

“Bell Bottom Country Music”

Wilson already classified the song as “Bell Bottom Country Music” when it was released a year before her fourth album Bell Bottom Country. Within the lyrics, Wilson tells a personal story of figuring out who she was and what she wanted, which ended a long-term relationship with a childhood sweetheart: Got a little hold on me, don’t get me wrong / But, baby, my heart runs wild and free … A home to you is a handed down farm / Little house on the back of your grandpa’s land / Home to me is this old guitar.

Waking up here in your arms
I feel like a queen in your king-size bed
The sun’s lightin’ up your face in the dark
And I see the wheels turnin’ in your head

Think you’re the one that’s gonna turn me around
Give me a ring and settle me down
Got a little hold on me, don’t get me wrong
But, baby, my heart runs wild and free
You gotta know ‘fore you fall for me
Like a feather in the wind, I could be gone
You don’t give a rock to a rolling stone

A home to you is a handed-down farm
Little house on the back of your grandpa’s land
Home to me is this old guitar
Yeah, a country song and a beat-up van

A Free Spirit

Co-written by Wilson, Tammi Kidd, and Brent Anderson, “Rolling Stone” is the story of chasing one’s dream over love.

“The one thing all of us songwriters in Nashville have in common is that we all moved here with a dream,” Wilson shared with American Songwriter in 2020. “A dream to write music and for our songs and hearts to be heard. I dated the same guy for seven years. But when it came time to chase my dreams, I felt like I was being held back. I decided I would not let anything stand in my way, and that meant letting go of him.

Ain’t got a thing to do with love / I was born to roll / Like a tumbleweed does / And I belong to a long highway / And there it goes, calling my name sings Wilson through the chugging arrangement, reiterating her freer spirit. 

[RELATED: 4 Songs You Didn’t Know Lainey Wilson Wrote: Exclusive Video Interview]

Wilson said she had this song shelved for years before connecting with producer Jay Joyce and recording it in March 2019.  “He lit up a cigarette, handed me a guitar, and told me to play something,” said Wilson. “I played this song ’cause we were trying to get to know each other at the time, and I felt like this helped tell my story.”

She added, “It started off with a train beat. I remember closing my eyes and singing while the guys tracked it and it felt like a western movie from top to bottom. Jay’s production brought it to life in that haunting make-ya-feel-something kinda way.”

Photo: Erika Goldring/Getty Images for CMT