Lauren Alaina first captured America’s attention as the runner-up on the tenth season of American Idol. Her debut studio album, ‘Wildflower,' released in 2011, showcased her powerful vocals and reached number five on the US Billboard 200. Alaina’s subsequent albums, ‘Road Less Traveled' (2017) and ‘Sitting Pretty on Top of the World' (2021), further solidified her presence in the country music scene. Notably, she achieved her first number one on the Country Airplay chart with the title track of ‘Road Less Traveled' and collaborated with Kane Brown on the Diamond-certified duet ‘What Ifs.' Her contributions to country music were honoured when she became the youngest member inducted into the Grand Ole Opry in 2022.
In January 2025, Lauren Alaina announced that she and her husband, Cam Arnold, are expecting their first child. She shared the joyous news through her music video for ‘Those Kind of Women' where she subtly revealed her pregnancy. Reflecting on this new chapter, Alaina expressed, “It’s like I was the Grinch or something, and my heart grew.” Amidst this personal milestone, she continues to evolve artistically, releasing her latest single, ‘Household,' last week. This new track underscores her growth as an artist and resonates with her audience, reflecting her journey both personally and professionally, and we were thrilled to catch up with Lauren to talk all about it.
Thank you for your time today, Lauren, we know just how busy you must be right now, personally and professionally, so it's much appreciated.
Of course! It's lovely to talk to you! There's a baby in there, for sure! (laughing)
As soon as we heard ‘Household' we were right onto Big Loud asking to talk to you – it's such a great song! Tell us about the inspirations behind it.
Thank you so much! (laughing) I got a call one day from one of my dear friends and she was talking to me about her marriage and complaining about how her husband was drinking a lot and how they just weren't getting along. She'd tried to talk to her mom about it and had received a reply from her that was basically, ‘well, you picked him!' (laughing)
She ended up calling me and as a songwriter……. I'm not always listening just to be able to write a song about everything…. but there's something in my brain that can engage itself in any point in a conversation and generate an idea for a song. I don't remember specifically what she said that prompted the thought but when we got off the phone I reached for my notepad and I wrote down ‘how much hell can a house hold.'
I love a play on words, it's my favourite thing to do in a song. I feel like that one, ‘How much hell can a household?' is one of my best! (laughing)
The vibe of the song and the meaning – that's quintessential Country music for me.
Thank you! I have really tried to hone in on what my sound is since signing with Big Loud. I've released a few records along the way but I have been very intentional on this album process to make sure that all of the songs are truly Country songs.
I'm from a small town in Georgia, I'm a country girl at heart. Since the pandemic I've spent a lot of time with my family, I've got married and now I'm having a baby – I've just kinda tapped into the ‘country-ness' of it all. Sometimes to move forward to have to look back, you know? I looked back at the girl who started this whole journey off for me and that sweet little Country girl in her cowboy boots, up on stage on American Idol, is who I am at my core.
My new music is going to reflect that. I mean, I love a 90s bop just as much as the next person – we're not abandoning that forever – but for this record, for my first full length project for Big Loud, I've been very strategic with the sound and ‘Household is a perfect representation of what I want to do in this phase of my career.
I can hear a through-line from ‘Household' back to ‘Those Kind of Women' too – the same message and the same southern spirit.
Very much so. All the new songs are very Country and they will all speak to southern women. That's who I am! (laughing) It's been so fun to truly just be myself on this project. I have a song that will be on the album….I haven't shared this yet but I'll share it with you… that my brother sings on! It's about his love story that I wrote for him. He's very shy but he loves singing – and it's things like that make me who I am.
‘Those Kind of Women' is all about the women that shaped me. Even on the ‘Unlocked' EP which had ‘Thicc as Thieves' on it there was a song called ‘Don't Judge a Woman'…….
Let's just stop there a minute Lauren – I was going to tell you that whilst you had a lot of fun in that phase with ‘Thicc as Thieves' I thought the best and most powerful song on that EP was ‘Don't Judge a Woman' – that song would very much fit in this era of your career now.
Very much so! That song is the same kind of idea that we are doing right now. Arguably, that's also my favourite song on that EP as well! (laughing) I, obviously, want to make music that appeals to everybody but it has to start from a true, authentic place in my heart, whether I write it or not, and resemble who I am as a person. I've always tried to do that with my lyrics but now I'm doing it sonically as well. I'm excited.
Is being pregnant having an effect on you in terms of your writing? You're becoming a mum, there must be all sorts of new thoughts and feelings around.
Definitely! Yes. (laughing) I also lost my father last year so I've written a lot about that. It was pretty crazy timing in terms of my dad passing in July and then finding out I was pregnant in September – it was a complete surprise for us, a completely unplanned pregnancy! (laughing) It's been so interesting to live through a phase where something went away and something came, you know, that's very biblical. I've written a lot about my daughter and a lot about my dad.
We do have a really fun song coming up that we haven't announced yet that isn't as Country as all the others too. One song that isn't as traditional as all the others on the album but it is so much fun. I cut the song because my husband demanded it, it's his favourite song and the one song that I did for my husband – when you hear it you'll be surprised that it's his favourite! (laughing)
He clearly knows that ‘Household' is not about him either, right?
(laughing) Yes! I make that joke every night on stage. We've just wrapped up a run with Rascal Flatts which was so much fun. I'm hoping they do some more shows and that they call me to go back out with them because it is such a good show. I'm obviously very pregnant when I'm out on tour with them, there's no hiding it when you are the size that I am at 6 to 8 months, right? (laughing) I'm up there singing ‘Household' every night and my favourite joke up on stage was to make a statement, as the very pregnant lady, that the song was not about my husband – however, he can still drive me crazy too!
We've been really leaning into the funny side of our marriage and sharing things that we haven't done before. My husband is hysterical, he's so funny……..
That's another question I was going to ask you because your Instagram story has become one of my must-watch feeds. The two of you are so funny on there together. Does that come naturally to you to share the ‘behind the curtain' look?
It's so funny – the idea came from my husband, who on his own Instagram page, would randomly post funny things I was doing. They are hysterical. He did that and the label and I were chatting about ‘Household' and how best to show that message on social media. I am not in a bad marriage but every marriage does have its quirks, right? That is our own way of showcasing just how much hell our own house can hold! We're obviously in a good place, we're about to have a child however we still drive each other crazy all the time – it's not easy to live with anybody – so we wanted to lean into the household thing.
I was hesitant to do it, at the beginning, as I've shared past relationships on social media before and then they didn't last but I thought this would be different given that I have fully hitched my wagon to ‘the husband' now, so here we are, warts-and-all! (laughing) With the artists that I love, I love getting little glimpses into their lives, so we are trying to do that with ours and having a lot of fun with it at the same time.
You're doing a similar thing with your ‘LA Lately' series on Youtube. I've just seen you had the Dickerson's over for a chat. Is there going to be more of those episodes coming down the line?
We have filmed somewhere between 6 and 10 episodes of that right now. I'm pregnant and the brain fog is real! (laughing) I can't exactly recall how many we've done but there are a few on the way. It's something we want to do more of, we have a lot of good friends that we want to be on there and would be perfect to talk to.
I love stuff like that – I would love to be a talk-show host one day. I went on the Kelly Clarkson show and I would love to do something that like one day. I look up to Kelly so much, everything about her I'm obsessed with! (laughing) I like acting, I like talking and I like entertainment in general alongside the songwriting – it's another way to engage the audience and share my stories with my friends.
I'm determined to be a working mom, you know? I'm having a daughter – every night when I went up on stage with Rascal Flatts people were, like, ‘how are you doing this when you are so pregnant?' I was, like, ‘I'm having a little girl that is gonna look up to me and I want her to see both things: that I am a hard-working woman and that she can do anything, even if you are pregnant! (laughing)
It's now been ten years since you released ‘History,' which is the oldest song you have out on Spotify. Can you believe it's been a decade? How have you changed as an artist and a writer in this decade?
Is that true? Has it been that long? WOW! I'm getting old. (laughing)
Oh man. I've gotten braver. I've become a human. It's quite a difference between being 20 when you are 30, right? I remember when I was 20, people telling me ‘just wait until you are 30' and I shook them off believing that I was a grown women, right? (laughing)
I've lived a lot of life in the last decade and the more life you live, the more truth you can share. I've also gotten more comfortable with sharing my truths as the years have gone by too. As a writer I've grown and matured and welcomed integrity, maturity and honesty into my writing – not that I didn't have those things before, I've just accepted them more.
‘History' is still one of my favourite things I've ever done because it was strictly something I did myself. ESPN were looking for a song for game day and I was up against some very prominent famous pop stars. I asked for their deck, the marketing tool they had prepared for the season ahead, and I used that as my template to write the song and got the gig! That was such an affirming moment for me as a songwriter – it taught me that I could compete with hot stars! Little moments like that really solidified my belief in myself as a writer. I always knew I could sing – I've been singing since I was three and always confident in doing that, praise the lord, but the songwriting thing took some time.
That's another thing where I've grown in the last decade – I've been lucky enough to write with some of the best writers in Nashville who have also helped me to grow and get better too. When I go into a writers room now I feel much more confident in what I've got to offer: don't get me wrong, I can still get nervous about it sometimes because you want to do your best but I now know who I am in the room and the other writers there know who I am now, as well.
Check out Lauren's fabulous new song ‘Household' which serves as a great preview of her upcoming album for Big Loud Records later in the year.
