Kelsea Ballerini Reveals Reason for Self-Titled Third Album

It took Kelsea Ballerini three albums to self-title one, but it’s finally happening with Kelsea, due to be released on March 20. The 26-year-old is opening up about the one-name title, explaining that the vulnerable and honest record couldn’t have been called anything but her name.

“I think a lot of people do self-titled as the first album,” Ballerini told Zane Lowe for Apple’s Beats 1. It didn’t feel right to me yet. I just feel like writing every song on it, co-producing it, really getting more self-aware on this album, talking about things I haven’t talked about before –– it felt like a first-name basis album. It felt like the one that was like, ‘Hey, you do know me, but here’s really how it is.”

Included on Kelsea is both her current single, “homecoming queen?” and a soul-baring track called “la,” which shares her complicated relationship with Los Angeles.

“I wrote this song alone on a bathroom floor in Los Angeles last year feeling equal parts like somebody and like nobody, surrounded and completely alone, inspired and terrified, on top of the world and filled to the brim with anxiety,” Ballerini posted on Instagram, discussing “la.”. “I was in between tour dates and left my guitar on the bus that particular week, so it came out as a stream of consciousness that fell into the form of a poem. As soon as I got to the bus a few days later it became this.

“It’s the most vulnerable thing I’ve publicly shared,” she added. “It’s not cool to talk about not feeling cool. but it’s honest, and I’m really proud of every word of it. ‘la’ is out NOW.”

While specific tour plans for Kelsea have yet to be announced, the Tennessee native acknowledges that she chose the songs based on her plans to perform them live.

“The first album, when I was making it, I had never played a show with a band, so I had no idea,” Ballerini told PopCulture.com and other media. “And then the second album, I had opened for people that I hadn’t really headlined properly yet, and then now that I’ve gotten to headline clubs, theaters, and then arenas, I understand what putting a full show together means and I love production. When I’m writing these songs, not only am I thinking of the music videos, I’m thinking of pyro or a hydraulic lift, you know, stuff like that.”

Kelsea is currently available for pre-order on her website.

Photo Credit: Getty / Taylor Hill