This week, Kacey Musgraves offers up a superb, folky ballad from her album Deeper Well, while ERNEST teams with the ubiquitous Jelly Roll for a new track, and Cyndi Thomson returns with "The Georgia in Me."

Country music has a storied tradition of artists nodding to their own less-than-shining moments that become central parts of their legend and legacies, from Haggard’s “Mama Tried” to George Jones’ “No Show Jones.” ERNEST and Jelly Roll are both Nashville natives and on this collaboration, they detail their unconventional journeys to stardom, from ERNEST dropping out after a year of college and Jelly Roll’s evolution from jail cell to CMA Award-winning artist. Along the way, they both paid their music industry dues, too. "Who came out on top/ Hell, it’s hard to tell," they sing triumphantly, bolstered by a flourishing of steel guitars, fiddle and piano.

In the two decades after releasing her debut album My World, Cyndi Thomson has released music sporadically. Her soft-edged, dusky vocal drawl is still as potent as a Southern magnolia, and front and center on her first new music since 2016, with this song she wrote with Paul Sikes. She reminisces about teenage summers spent on red dirt roads, filled with fun-loving Saturday nights and glory-giving Sunday mornings, with the song also nodding to another Georgia-born country singer, Trisha Yearwood.

Matt Koziol's blues-country track "I Was" captures the essence of his former days of flying too fast down an unhealthy road. The understated piano and percussion lend an oak-wood warmth to Koziol’s crackling fire of a voice. This track is from Koziol’s upcoming album Last of the Old Dogs.

Ben Rector and Hailey Whitters collaborate on the quirky, feel-good love song "Color Up My World." On this banjo-flecked track, Rector’s vocal balances both quick-wit and charisma, while Whitters’ smooth twang is the sweetener.

The Voice alum Madison Hughes showcases her adroit guitar skills and purring vocal on her bluesy country tune "Hate That You Love Me." Her voice is world-weary, her guitar tones threaded with angst, as she offers up a relatable tale of falling headlong for a charismatic heart-breaker.

Riley Green offers a subdued rendition of Josh Thompson's hit "Way Out Here." His take is more subdued, with slightly moodier production, on this 15-year-old song about defending rural living, but he delivers this track with plenty of heart.