Kelsea Ballerini Vents About Her Ex Morgan Evans on New Songs

Kelsea Ballerini is using her art to express herself, as the singer’s new music finds her venting about her ex-husband, Morgan Evans. Whiskey Riff was first to point out that the song lyrics from Ballerini’s new EP, Rolling Up the Welcome Mat, seem to be directly about her and Evans’ marriage falling apart. In “Mountain With A View,” the first track on the project, Ballerini sings, “I’m wearin’ the ring still, but I think I’m lyin’.”

She continues, “Sometimes you forget yours, I think we’re done tryin’. I realize you loved me much more at twenty-three. I think that this is when it’s over for me…” This appears to be a direct response to Evans’ song “Over For You,” which featured the following lyrics: “How long have you been waiting to take our pictures down… I would have searched the whole world over for you… How long has it been over for you?”

Later in “Mountain With A View,” Ballerini sings, “I’m takin’ the ring off, I’m finally cryin’. Don’t try to find yours, no reason to fight it. You’ll say I’m crazy for bein’ the one to leave. Scream I’m just like my parents and givin’ up easy. But you never took that last flight to see me. Looks like our ending ain’t endin’ happily. I think that this is when it’s over for me…”

In addition to addressing her failed marriage through her music, Ballerini is also opening up about the relationship in a new episode of the Call Her Daddy podcast, hosted by Alexandra Cooper. In a preview clip shared by PEOPLE, Ballerini says candidly, “There were separations, there was years of couples therapy. There was like, many a night of sleeping on the couch,” she said. “I don’t think it was the first night, but it was a night where I was like, this is not what I want.”

She went on to share: “I slept on the couch the night before the CMAs and I remember I went to rehearsal at the arena and texting him and being like, ‘I’ll just see you at the carpet.’” After being asked about why she slept on the couch so often, Ballerini stated that the couple had a “disconnection” for some time. “We hadn’t seen each other, there was a lack of effort to see each other. I was getting resentful because any time we did see each other, I felt like I was carrying that load, and I was tired,” she said. “I was just tired of showing up in that way all the time and not feeling like I was seen or matched.”

In response to Ballerini’s songs and comments on Call Her Daddy, Evans shared a statement on Instagram. “It’s really sad for me to see this person, who I spent so much of my life with, and loved with all my heart, saying things that aren’t reality and that leave out what really happened,” he wrote. “She knows I’m not the type of guy to speak on those things publicly. If this is what she needs to heal, I hope it helps. All I ask is if that you’re on my pages, please don’t be mean. Don’t be mean to Kelsea, don’t be mean to each other.” He  then concluded his statement with: “Life’s too short.”