Meghan Patrick has captivated fans since her breakthrough with the award-winning ‘Grace & Grit' in 2016, earning her a reputation as one of country music's most compelling voices. Known for her raw, unapologetic storytelling, the Nashville-based singer-songwriter connects with audiences through music that feels both deeply personal and universally relatable. With accolades that include back-to-back Canadian Country Music Association (CCMA) Female Artist of the Year awards and multiple CMAOntario awards, Patrick has solidified her place as a force in the industry, bringing authenticity and grit to every performance.
Hailing from rural Ontario, Patrick’s musical journey is as varied as it is impressive. She began by forming an all-girl band at 13, then went on to study opera and jazz, fronted a 10-piece funk band that opened for Aretha Franklin, and toured with a bluegrass group—experiences that have enriched her eclectic sound.
Her latest album, ‘Golden Child,' showcases Patrick's powerful, versatile vocals and heartfelt storytelling. The album weaves through themes of resilience, family trauma, and personal growth, showing Patrick as both a big sister and self-help guide to her listeners. Her deeply honest approach to life’s struggles shines through, creating an emotional journey that resonates long after the last note fades, and solidifying her as a powerhouse artist with a unique voice in country music. We were thrilled to catch up with her to talk all about it.
Thanks for your time today Meghan, it's great to touch base with you about your wonderful new album. Have you been pleased with the reaction to it?
Thank you. Yeah, it's been an incredible reaction, for sure. All of the things that I hoped people would love about it and take it from it seems to be what they are getting from it.
Are there any particular songs that you are sensing from social media or streaming numbers that are hitting more than other?
You know, I try not to look at streaming numbers too much, it just gets inside my head. I like to gauge people's reaction to songs largely from my live shows and seeing what songs they respond to live. ‘Stoned Alone' is a song that people are definitely responding to live right now. ‘Golden Child,' too, people seem to love that one too.
Let's pick up on ‘Stoned Alone' then before we dig into the album a little. What a cool video you've shot for that song. Do you like being in front of the cameras or do you see it as a necessary evil?
A bit of both, maybe? (laughing) I used to hate it and feel really uncomfortable about it but I've gotten a little more used to it and a little more confident in understanding the way a shoot works. A lot of it comes down to the people you work with, right? I have an incredible creative team and I love working with Ford Fairchild – our brains kinda work the same way and we have immense respect for each other, which helps the process immensely.
‘Golden Child' opens with such a gut-punch on the powerful ‘Blood From a Stone.' That is such a raw, vulnerable song. It must have been a hard write for you – how long were you sitting with the idea and those feelings?
Well. To give you some context, obviously the song tells the story of my relationship, or really lack of relationship now, with my mother. Before I wrote that song I hadn't really said a lot of those things out loud, let alone thought about writing a song about it. I wrote the song a few months before Mitchell (Tenpenny, Meghan's husband) and I got married. Things were really, really bad between my mother and I at that point and I was feeling frustrated because I knew that her behaviour was very toxic. Therapy had helped me to see that a lot of things she had done to me over the years were not normal or healthy and I'd reached a point where I thought that she wouldn't be able to come to the wedding without ruining the day somehow.
I decided to write her a letter and lay out all my feelings to her. Although, when I say letter I mean just a really long text! I wrote out everything I felt about all the ways she had hurt me over the years. My parents were divorced, my sister hadn't had a relationship with her for years and I was the last remaining one. I said that I loved her and had been there for her over the years but that she had taken no accountability or shown no signs of ever changing. I said to her that until she took some accountability for her behaviours and did some work on herself I couldn't have her in my life……………………… She never responded.
On the one hand that was pretty devastating and hurtful but at the same time, it kinda just re-affirmed what I knew about her and the relationship that we had. That was it, I guess. It was cathartic in the sense that her lack of response gave me permission to move on and gave me permission to stop feeling guilty about trying to establish some boundaries and work on my own happiness.
The day I wrote ‘Blood from a Stone' was three days after I'd sent the text letter without a response. I was really coming to that realisation that she wasn't going to respond and that she just didn't care. I went into the write and we were trying to write something else that day but I was so consumed with what was going on that I had to say to my co-writers, Karen Kosowski and Emma Lee, that I needed to tell them what was going on, it was the only thing I could think about. They said, ‘Do you want to write about it?' The lyrics spilled out of me and they gave me a really safe space to let it all out. I didn't know whether it would make the album, I was still healing and still felt a little under my mother's thumb in terms of not wanting to be a ‘bad daughter' but I got to a place in my healing where I realised I wasn't the problem. It helped that people on my team were floored by the song too and we decided to put it on the record – but it wasn't out of spite or designed to hurt her – it wasn't about her at all, really, it's about me and my story in the context of the whole narrative of the album.
And your own healing journey………..
Absolutely. Even just last night I got to host my second annual fundraiser for survivors of domestic violence, which we also talk about on the record. We kinda doubled it as the album release party for ‘Golden Child' but I was nervous because last year when we did it, we did it in this smaller room of the venue but this year we moved it to the bigger room – and it's a really BIG room! (laughing) I was so anxious about everything being right and I had to check myself and tell myself that this is the mentality I'm trying to leave behind, this idea that my worthiness and my value is tied to my success. That's still part of my journey and what a large part of this record is about.
But that's what makes it such a powerful listen. There's such light and shade, emotional nuance and heartfelt messaging too. It's everything good country music should be – and then a song like ‘What Shoulder' comes along and injects some brevity. You wrote that song with Trannie Anderson and Ella Langley – two women very much in demand in Nashville these days – what was it like working with them?
Ella and I have been friends for a couple of years now since we met at a songwriters retreat in Hawaii. We've got a similar outlook on life and very much clicked pretty much straight away! Trannie and I have been writing together for years, I love her and Dallas Wilson, also, was on that write – they are some of my best friends and have been since I came to town all those years ago.
I love writing no matter what but when you can do it with people who are your actual friends too, there's nothing better than that. Ella came and sang at my fundraising event last night, we got up and sang ‘What Shoulder' together, which was really fun. I just so blessed to be surrounded by so many incredibly talented women who are also my friends. We are in an industry that loves to pit women against each other and that tries to make us think that there ‘can only be one,' that ‘there's only room for one,' which is just so not true.
You also wrote with people like Kelly Archer, Tyler Hubbard, Devin Dawson, Caitlyn Smith….who we are such big fans of…..Natalie Hemby too. Was there one writer you connected with over all the others in putting this project together?
Ohhh, don't get me started on Caitlyn Smith! (laughing) Oh gosh, it would probably be Karen Kosowski because she was also my producer too. Some of the songs on the record had been released previously last year but I wanted them to be on there because they fitted the narrative of what I was trying to say so well. ‘Boy Who Cried Drunk,' ‘God and a Good Man,' Other Side of 25,' right? I felt like they were a part of my story and needed to be on the record but all of the new stuff we cut was all produced by Karen. She immersed herself fully into my story fully with me. We worked so closely on how everything all fitted together and what everything needed to sound like.
I didn't grow up listening to just strictly country music. I grew up on a lot of kinda Country-adjacent music like Folk, Americana, southern rock and classic rock. I didn't listen to a lot of mainstream Country music until I was in my twenties, it was around because I grew up in a rural area but it wasn't massively part of my early years. Because of that, I have an immense love of all genres but the tough part of that, when I am creating, is trying to make sense of everything and making sure it all fits together and Karen was pivotal in helping me do that. She cared so deeply about this project and I am so grateful for that. I equally loved everyone I worked with on this record and feel blessed to have been able to write with such incredibly talented people but Karen and the other producers on the record, like Joey and Aaron, were just that little bit above in terms of taking the record to the finish line.
Watch Meghan talk about songs like ‘Every Dog' and ‘Good Tastin' Whiskey' and how her dating life before Mitchell was less than optimal:
I definitely went through a string of really bad relationships although I sometimes wonder if I did it subconsciously in order to be able to write better songs! (laughing) At the root of it was just a lack of self-love. I didn't love or value myself the way I needed to. I got out of an abusive relationship about ten years ago now and did about 2 years of pretty consistent therapy – it was devastating, he almost took my life. I had to literally try and de-program myself for years and years after that relationship and there are still little things that crop up here and there that send me right back to that time.
Moving to Nashville put me in a different head space. I wasn't coming here for a boy, I was coming here for a career and to work and so I immersed myself in that and then, of course, that was when I met Mitchell! (laughing) That kinda stuff always happens when you least expect it, right? (laughing) Thankfully, I finally got it right.
We were thrilled to have Mitchell over here for the C2C festival a couple of years ago – he made a lot of friends – do you have any plans to come over to Europe at all in this next phase?
Oh, trust me, I'm onto my agent and team about it all the time! I've yet to play overseas. I'm hoping that there will be some opportunities in 2025 to do that. I know I have a lot of fans in the UK and Ireland – I see them commenting on my pages, particularly on TikTok! I think I ended up on a UK / Ireland algorithm or something because there's so many comments and messages from people over there on my videos. Yes, I'm working on it, trust me.
You've got a solid history of releasing Christmas songs – is it too late for this year or have you got one up your sleeve?
Oh gosh! You know what, it might be too late for this year, I haven't even thought about it because we've been so immersed in the ‘Golden Child' journey. It's not completely out of the realm of possibility but it probably is! (laughing)
‘I Hope it Snows' is a great song. Is that the only time you and Mitchell have duetted together so far?
It is! Yeah. People are wanting a duet and we'll give it to them at some point. It's just tough because we get so little time together that when we do have that time we just wanna hang out as a couple and not do work. We were talking about that the other day, about wanting to be more intentional about writing with each other and getting a song out.
Part of it has been from my end, really. With coming from Canada and moving to Nashville I had to kind of start all over again as a brand new artist and it was really important to me to try and forge my own path and make a career for myself outside of Mitchell and being married to him. He gets that. I wanted to make a name for myself first before I did a song with him.
Go check out Megan Patrick's new album ‘Golden Child' in all the usual places and I think you'll agree with us that she has definitely made a name for herself with it!
