''Palomino'' is the ninth studio album by American

country music Country (also called country and western) is a popular music, music genre originating in the southern regions of the United States, both the American South and American southwest, the Southwest. First produced in the 1920s, country music is p ...

singer

Miranda Lambert Miranda Leigh Lambert (born November 10, 1983) is an American country music, country singer. Born in Longview, Texas, she started out in early 2001 when she released her self-titled debut album independently. In 2003, she finished in third place ...

, released through Vanner Records and

RCA Records Nashville RCA Nashville is an American country music record label based in Nashville, Tennessee. It is distributed by Sony Music Nashville which is part of Sony Music. Artists Current artists *Kane Brown * Corey Kent * Nate Smith * Morgan Wade Former art ...

on April 29, 2022. It is her eighth solo studio album. Lambert produced the album alongside Luke Dick and

Jon Randall Jon Randall Stewart (born February 17, 1969) is an American producer, songwriter, and musician. His career began as a guitarist for Emmylou Harris' Nash Ramblers with whom he won his first Grammy for their ''Live at the Ryman'' album in 1992. Be ...

and co-wrote 14 of the 15 tracks. It was preceded by the single " If I Was a Cowboy". This was her last album with

Sony Music Nashville Sony Music Nashville is the country music branch of the Sony Music, Sony Music Group. Based in Nashville, Tennessee, Sony Music Nashville includes its three country recording labels Arista Nashville, Columbia Records#Columbia Nashville, Colu ...

. The album was nominated for the

Country Music Association Award for Album of the Year The following list shows the recipients for the Country Music Association Award for Album of the Year. The inaugural recipient of the award was '' There Goes My Everything'' by Jack Greene in 1967, with Jessi Colter becoming the first female win ...

Background and writing

Lambert began writing the songs on her farm in

Tennessee Tennessee (, ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders Kentucky to the north, Virginia to the northeast, North Carolina t ...

in 2020 with Luke Dick and

Natalie Hemby Natalie Nicole Hemby Wrucke (born March 24, 1977) is an American country music songwriter and singer. She has written songs for Lee Ann Womack, Eli Young Band, Toby Keith, Miranda Lambert, Sunny Sweeney, Little Big Town, Jon Pardi, Kacey Musgr ...

. In 2021, Lambert collaborated with

Jack Ingram Jack Owen Ingram (born November 15, 1970) is an American country music artist formerly signed to Big Machine Records, an independent record label. He has released eleven studio albums, one extended play, six live albums, and 19 singles. Alt ...

and

on the album '' The Marfa Tapes'', on which "In His Arms", "Waxahachie", and "Geraldene" first appeared in a "stripped" acoustic form. The tracks were re-recorded for ''Palomino''. Lambert collaborated with

the B-52's The B-52s, originally presented as the B-52's (with an errant apostrophe; used until 2008), are an American band formed in Athens, Georgia, in 1976. The original lineup consisted of Fred Schneider (vocals, percussion), Kate Pierson (vocals, k ...

for "Music City Queen" and covered

Mick Jagger Sir Michael Philip Jagger (born 26 July 1943) is an English musician. He is known as the lead singer and one of the founder members of The Rolling Stones. Jagger has co-written most of the band's songs with lead guitarist Keith Richards; Jagge ...

's 1993 song "Wandering Spirit" for the album.

Promotion

"Strange" and "Actin' Up" were released ahead of the album as promotional singles. Lambert performed "Geraldine" at the 56th Annual Country Music Association Awards.

Critical reception

''Palomino'' was well-received by the music critics, On review aggregator

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

, ''Palomino'' received a score of 83 out of 100 based on seven reviews, indicating "universal acclaim". In an early review, Jon Freeman of ''

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. The magazine was first known fo ...

'' gave ''Palomino'' four out of five stars, calling the album a "welcome departure" for Lambert. Will Hermes of ''

Pitchfork A pitchfork or hay fork is an agricultural tool used to pitch loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves. It has a long handle and usually two to five thin tines designed to efficiently move such materials. The term is also applie ...

'' gave the album a 7.6/10, stating that "Lambert's breadth is on full display".

Year-end lists

Commercial performance

''Palomino'' debuted at number four on the US ''Billboard'' 200 with 36,000

album-equivalent unit The album-equivalent unit, or album equivalent, often shortened to just unit, is a sales metric in the music industry that defines the number of streaming media, songs streamed and music download, songs downloaded equal to one Record sales, tradi ...

s (including 24,000 album sales), making it the highest debut of 2022 for a country artist and the most units earned in the first week for a country album in 2022. It is Lambert's seventh top-10 album. As of December 2022, the album has over 300 million global streams and 130,000 global sales.

Track listing

Personnel

Musicians

Cary Barlowe Cary Barlowe (born 1982) is a multi No.1 hit American music songwriter, guitarist and a family member of the rock band Luna Halo. He is also a three-time Grammy Award-nominee. Born in Virginia on a Saturday, July 31, 1982, and raised in Nort ...

– electric guitar *

Sarah Buxton Sarah Jane Buxton (born July 3, 1980) is an American country music singer formerly signed to the independent Lyric Street Records. Between 2006 and 2008, she issued three singles from an extended play titled '' Almost My Record'', in addition t ...

– background vocals *Luke Dick – acoustic guitar, bass guitar, electric guitar, ganjo, harmonica, keyboards, percussion, programming,

steel guitar A steel guitar () is any guitar played while moving a steel bar or similar hard object against plucked strings. The bar itself is called a "steel" and is the source of the name "steel guitar". The instrument differs from a conventional guitar i ...

, background vocals, handclaps *

Fred Eltringham The Wallflowers are an American rock solo project of American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Jakob Dylan. The Wallflowers were originally a roots rock band formed in Los Angeles by Dylan and guitarist Tobi Miller. It has undergone ...

– drums, percussion, handclaps *

Ian Fitchuk Ian Fitchuk (born February 13, 1982) is an American songwriter and record producer. Early life Fitchuk was born in Chicago to parents who are both accomplished classical musicians and educators. He grew up there. He cites Paul Simon's ''Grace ...

–

B-3 organ The Hammond organ is an electric organ invented by Laurens Hammond and John M. Hanert, first manufactured in 1935. Multiple models have been produced, most of which use sliding drawbars to vary sounds. Until 1975, sound was created from rotat ...

, bass guitar,

Fender Rhodes The Rhodes piano (also known as the Fender Rhodes piano) is an electric piano invented by Harold Rhodes, which became popular in the 1970s. Like a conventional piano, the Rhodes generates sound with keys and hammers, but instead of strings, t ...

, keyboards, percussion, piano *

Kenny Greenberg Kenneth S. Greenberg is an American guitarist, songwriter, producer, and session musician. He is known for bringing a rock-and-roll sensibility to Nashville recording sessions. Biography Greenberg was born in Cleveland, Ohio but attended junio ...

– steel guitar *

– background vocals *

– lead vocals, background vocals *Jason Lehning – bass guitar, keyboards *Alfreda McCrary – background vocals *Beverly McCrary – background vocals *Regina McCrary – background vocals *Rob McNelley – acoustic guitar, electric guitar, handclaps *

Al Perkins Al Perkins (born January 18, 1944) is an American guitarist known primarily for his steel guitar work. The Gibson guitar company called Perkins "the world's most influential Dobro player" and began producing an "Al Perkins Signature" Dobro in 2 ...

–

pedal steel guitar The pedal steel guitar is a console steel guitar with pedals and knee levers that change the pitch of certain strings, enabling more varied and complex music to be played than with other steel guitar designs. Like all steel guitars, it can play ...

Kate Pierson Catherine Elizabeth Pierson (born April 27, 1948) is an American singer, lyricist, and founding member of the B-52s. She plays guitar, bass and various keyboard instruments. In the early years, as well as being a vocalist, Pierson was the main ...

– background vocals on "Music City Queen" *

– acoustic guitar,

mandolin A mandolin (, ; literally "small mandola") is a Chordophone, stringed musical instrument in the lute family and is generally Plucked string instrument, plucked with a plectrum, pick. It most commonly has four Course (music), courses of doubled St ...

, background vocals, handclaps *Mikey Reaves – bass guitar, electric guitar, programming *

Fred Schneider Frederick William Schneider III (born July 1, 1951) is an American singer-songwriter and frontman of the rock band the B-52s, of which he is a founding member. Schneider is well known for his '' sprechgesang'', which he developed from reciting ...

– background vocals on "Music City Queen" *Jimmy Wallace – keyboards *

Cindy Wilson Cynthia Leigh Wilson (born February 28, 1957) is an American musician and one of the vocalists, songwriters and founding members of New wave music, new wave rock band the B-52s. She is noted for her distinctive contralto voice and also plays per ...

– background vocals on "Music City Queen" *Craig Young – bass guitar, handclaps

Technical

*Luke Dick – producer (all tracks) *

– producer (all tracks) *

– producer (all tracks) *Mikey Reaves – producer (track 11) *Jason Lehning – mixing engineer (all tracks)

Other

*Alena Moran – production coordinator (all tracks)

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

References

{{Miranda Lambert 2022 albums Albums produced by Jon Randall Miranda Lambert albums RCA Records albums