If Carly Pearce is being honest, she's never met a stranger.
The Taylor Mill, Kentucky native calls herself an oversharer, someone who rarely holds back about the good, the bad or anything in between.
"Sometimes I should shut up," the country singer said with a laugh inside the offices of her new label BMG.
But that honesty — the kind of real-life candor that might come from an older sister — has powered a career built on turning her roller coaster experiences into songs: heartbreak, divorce, faith, ambition and, yes, the man who failed a basic test of character.
He did not like her dogs.
Pearce is done apologizing. She's owning her truth.
"We live in a time right now, especially as a female, where everybody's trying to be younger and seem younger and look
younger and all these different things," Pearce said. "And I'm done with it. I'm done with the timelines. I'm done with where we should be, what we should look like, hiding your age. I'm 36, and I'm really proud of it."
Her fifth studio album, "Honest Woman," arrives Aug. 28 with 16 songs from an artist less concerned with whether she is moving at the same speed as everyone else.
"I think womanhood and just being somebody who's lived some life, that's how you gain wisdom," she said. "And I want that to be celebrated."
Early beginning with Song Suffragettes
Pearce moved to Nashville 17 years ago with the kind of certainty that belongs to a teenager with a dream and no real reason yet to doubt it.
In March 2014, she played the fourth-ever Song Suffragettes show. The all-female songwriter collective was created to give women a stage in an industry where they have often struggled to find one. Its weekly Nashville writers' rounds have since featured artists including Kelsea Ballerini, Lainey Wilson, Mickey Guyton, Megan Moroney and Brittney Spencer.
Since 2014, the organization has helped put more than 500 women on its stage, founder Todd Cassetty said, selecting them from a pool of more than 4,000 applicants.
Twelve years later, Pearce returned to be honored with Song Suffragettes' 2026 Yellow Rose of Inspiration Award, bringing handwritten notes for each of the women performing that night.
"You could tell she remembered what it felt like to be at this level," Cassetty said.
"It equally made me emotional and also gave me PTSD because I'm like, 'My God, you have no idea what is about to happen to you,'" Pearce said. "Are you going to be okay? Can I put you in bubble wrap and make sure that you preserve who you are?"
At the Aug. 10 showcase, five women took the stage at different points in their careers, with Pearce's path serving as a beacon for what might be possible.
Among them was 18-year-old Hadlie Jo, a Louisiana native who moved to Nashville the day after Christmas. The showcase marked her third time performing.
"I'm just getting started," Hadlie Jo said. Pearce's journey, she said, is a reminder that "time is really on your side."
Like Pearce, Hadlie Jo hopes one day to become a member of the Grand Ole Opry.
For Paige Rose, the night marked a different milestone. After nine years in Nashville, Aug. 10 was her first day as a full-time musician, following her decision to leave her corporate marketing job.
She has performed at Song Suffragettes 14 times since 2022 and said Pearce represents the kind of artist she hopes to become.
"When I talk about like what I would love, my dream trajectory, it's to have Carly's career," Rose said. "She just looks very happy and very content in the music she's making. I want to be able to write my story and share my songs and still look in the mirror and be like, 'Yeah, I stuck to who I was the whole time.'"
The vulnerable lyrics of 'Happy For Myself'
Pearce once went engagement-ring shopping with her longtime assistant, who was preparing to marry the singer's production manager.
She helped choose between platinum and yellow gold. Then she waited until she was alone in her car to cry.
At the time, Pearce was still waiting to find her person. She was happy for her friend, but the experience brought up a harder question: When could she be happy for herself?
That feeling of being left out runs through "Honest Woman."
Pearce ends the album with "Why God Why Me," a song with lyrics about looking back at moments when things didn't happen the way she wanted.
"I think He continues to show me every day," Pearce said, speaking about her faith. "I think His message for me is, 'Give me the opportunity to show you where you're meant to be.'"
Getting there takes a few turns.
"Same Circus" recognizes the familiar trap of dating the same type of man: "same circus, different clown." And the high-energy "Leave My Heart Alone" draws a more playful boundary: We can have fun, just don't touch my heart.
Then there's "He Don't Like My Dogs."
Pearce's Shih Tzus, Johnny and June, are her "pride and joy." She had wanted to write a song about them for years, but there was an obvious problem: A song about your dogs can get cheesy fast.
Then someone was mean to Johnny.
"Johnny and I talked and we had to kick him out of the family, and we had to kick him out fast," she said.
Collaborating with country and bluegrass artists like Dan Tyminski
The album's collaborators show the different sides of Pearce's musical world.
Riley Green joins her on the current single, "If I Don't Leave I'm Gonna Stay." Pearce immediately imagined Green's voice would be perfect for the song, sent him a text and he answered five minutes later.
"He is just a true, simple storyteller," Pearce said, adding that Green writes many of his songs by himself.
Dan Tyminski and Molly Tuttle bring Pearce back to bluegrass on "What If You Loved Me," a song that flips unrequited love around and wonders what life would look like if Pearce were the one who had moved on.
She grew up listening to Tyminski with Alison Krauss and Union Station and was such a fan that when interviewers asked about her celebrity crush, she named Tyminski.
Years later, his team reached out and he and Pearce wrote a duet together, "Who's Lying Here," which explores a woman lying beside one man while thinking about another, leaving the title to ask who is really doing the lying. It's classic Pearce writing, turning a familiar phrase on its head and letting a double meaning do the work.
An honest woman makes sacrifices along the way
Pearce is no longer waiting for her turn to find happiness. The Grammy winner, Grand Ole Opry member and CMA female vocalist of the year is dating entrepreneur Jordan Karcher, whom she publicly introduced to fans on Instagram in July 2025.
"Yes, the dream has come true," she said. "On paper, I have accomplished every single thing I ever wanted to in my life. I don't think a lot of people get to say that."
But Pearce learned that dreams come with fine print, a tension she explores on the opening track, "Dream Come True."
The song explores the sacrifices she has made for her career.
"Dream come true / Bought me a house at the end of a cul-de-sac / Four bedrooms / But I only use one / Dream come true / Got me a gig on my best friend's wedding day / Same old news / She knew I couldn't come."
"I wanted to take you on my personal journey of life," she said, adding her life is both "beautiful and really hard at the same time."
All things considered, Pearce's journey shows that building a career in Music City takes years of grinding and performing at smaller showcases like Song Suffragettes, practice writing vulnerable lyrics and collaborating with a wide variety of artists, plus being honest about tradeoffs that come with the price of fame. It took years for Pearce to become the songwriter who could create an album like "Honest Woman."
And, for an album about ignoring timelines, "Honest Woman" arrives at a unique trust-the-process moment. After years of singing about relationships that didn't work, Pearce was asked whether the album title might foreshadow another meaning of the phrase.
Could she soon be made an honest woman?
"You mean getting my happy ending?" she said. "I'm ready."
Maybe that's the answer to the question at the heart of "Happy For Myself." Someone else's turn coming first doesn't mean yours is not coming.
"There is no timeline that anybody should think that their time is up," Pearce said. "You can find love at any point. Keep believing, keep showing up, keep putting yourself out there. You can find a hot man, too."
Bryan West is a music reporter at The Tennessean, part of the USA TODAY Network. Follow him on Instagram, TikTok and X as @BryanWestTV.
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: 3 lessons Carly Pearce learned chasing her country music dreams
