Lori McKenna Recalls Writing 'Cry Pretty' With Carrie Underwood

Lori McKenna has written some of the most successful songs in country music, including "Humble and Kind" by Tim McGraw, and "Girl Crush" by Little Big Town. But her biggest hit might be Carrie Underwood's current single, "Cry Pretty," which McKenna and Underwood wrote with Hillary Lindsey and Liz Rose.

"It was just great to have a girl day hanging out with her, talking about Whole Foods!" McKenna recalls to Billboard. "She wanted to talk about our husbands and our kids. It was just like another girl in the room, except she can sing like Carrie Underwood."

Surprisingly, the writing session, where the three women (who call themselves the Love Junkies) wrote with Underwood was the first time McKenna got to collaborate with the country music icon.

"That was my first time writing with Carrie Underwood," McKenna reveals. "She cut a Love Junkies song on her last record ['Like I'll Never Love You Again'], and we got to sing with her a couple years ago, and she's been great to us. And obviously Hillary is such a big part of Carrie's world, because she wrote 'Jesus, Take the Wheel,' and she's had so many Carrie cuts, and they work together so well.

"That was a great day for me, just getting to know Carrie a little bit better, but also I love the days where you have an artist in the room, watching one of your co-writers click with that artist," McKenna continues. "That's when I'm trying to steal ideas to learn what's the best way to write with an artist."

"Cry Pretty," the title track of Underwood's upcoming album, became Underwood's re-introduction to country music, and her fans, after her accident last November, which resulted in a facial injury and a broken wrist.

"Hillary came in with the title and a few lines and we all just loved it," Underwood says of the day they wrote "Cry Pretty." "I mean we're all women in different places in our lives and kind of have all lived different lives and from different places, but we all love music and we all love sharing our heart in our music. Off we went.

"I left that day so excited and feeling so good about and couldn't wait to get my hands on it, as an artist and also as a producer," she continues. "So, it's come a long way since the day we wrote it, but it's something I'm very proud of."

The American Idol alum acknowledges that "Cry Pretty" became her way of dealing with all the events that transpired since the accident.

"The title refers to when emotions take over and you just can't hold them back," Underwood admits. "It really speaks to a lot of things that have happened in the past year and I hope when you hear it, you can relate those feelings to those times in your life. It's emotional. It's real."

McKenna, who has also had cuts by Keith Urban, Sara Evans, Reba McEntire and more, spends most – but not all – of her days writing, but concedes that even when many of her co-writes (and now friends) are artists, she doesn't write every day.

"I have gotten to the point where I'm like, 'I cannot write a song today. I just need today to be a regular day without trying to rhyme words,'" McKenna says. "Sometimes I check every guitar in my house and there's just not a song there."

Cry Pretty will be released on Sept. 14. Download the single on iTunes.

Photo Credit: Getty images/Rick Diamond