ABC/Image Group LASince returning to her longtime label, MCA Nashville, earlier this year, Reba McEntire‘s last two projects have been re-releases of her classic albums, 1994’s Read My Mind, and 1990’s Rumor Has It.

But Reba’s not resting on her laurels. She’s busy working on the follow-up to last year’s Stronger Than the Truth.

“Right now, I’m looking for songs, and we’re narrowing ’em down,” she reveals. “I probably had fifty songs that I absolutely loved…”

“That’s what we’ve been doing is really listening…” she continues. “And if there’s a song that I kind of lose interest in, I will put it on the back burner for maybe later.”

Even in a global pandemic, Reba says there’s no shortage of songs in Nashville.

“The songwriters are hot right now,” she observes. “There are so many great songs out there and so many people have taken this time and this opportunity to sit and write. Everybody’s writing via Zoom, and they’re getting along great with it.”

That includes Reba herself.

“I go nine-hundred-mile-an-hour all day long,” she explains. “I’m exhausted when I lay down. And I sleep really well. But I love life and I enjoy doing what I do. So I just rechannel that to try to be more creative. I’ve even written — co-written — a few songs.”

In keeping with her positive outlook, Reba says we can expect a “happier album,” which is perhaps a harbinger of the changes she hopes to see once we put COVID-19 in the past.

“I hope our new normal is a better new normal,” she reflects. “I hope we’re nicer, I hope we’re kinder. I wish all this hate and anxiety would go away. I wish that would definitely go away. I want a better normal.”

By Stephen Hubbard
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