If you’re taking advice from Dolly Parton, you’re probably on the right track.
Lainey Wilson announced today that her forthcoming album Whirlwind is due out everywhere on August 28th, and she sat down for an extensive interview with Billboard to discuss everything from the record, to some about her personal life.
Of course, Lainey caused a stir last year at the 2023 ACM Awards when she went public with her relationship with former NFL player Devlin “Duck” Hodges for the first time, and since then, they’ve been on quite a few other red carpets together.
And while you’ll see photos of them together here and there, for the most part, the pair keeps their relationship pretty private… which Lainey says is very much on purpose, and done in part because of advice from the legendary Dolly Parton, who has kept her 57-year marriage extremely private and out of the public eye.
Dolly has always said it’s important to keep some things to yourself, especially when you’re as famous as she is, and Lainey says that’s the approach she and Duck have agreed works best for them, too, especially considering that they’re both public figures:
“When it comes to mine and Duck’s relationship, there’s going to be some things that we can’t escape and people are going to say and do whatever, but me and him are on the same page about the less we put out there, the less that we’re going to have to deal with people making anything up and saying anything.
We want to keep that as sacred as we possibly can between me and him, and so far, it has worked for us.”
And honestly, that seems to be a winning strategy and probably the best way to do it.
But we might get a small peak into their relationship and love story with Lainey’s aforementioned new album, because she’s mentioned several times in the last year or so that she’s been writing love songs for the first time because of Duck.
That’s something she’s really never done before, and I’m looking forward to hearing this new side of Lainey in love.
And speaking of everything Lainey’s accomplished in the last year or two, the Louisiana native recently scored her seventh $1 hit at country radio with “Wildflowers and Wild Horses,” and is planning to open up a bar in downtown Nashville, Bell Bottoms Up, this summer.
“Wildflowers and Wild Horses”
