"Are you in or are you out? / With all the sins I'm thinking about / Or do you have a better bad idea?" teases Sunny Sweeney on "Better Bad Idea," the second track on her soon-to-be released fourth album, Trophy. The entire album, a follow up to 2014's Provoked, finds Sweeney reckoning with her personal failings and experiences. It's a shift from her previous work, which relied heavily on "bad girl" narratives (quotes because, well, that's another discussion for another time) and less autobiographical experiences. But don't you dare worry, because the Texas-born artist hasn't put out the fire under her feet, proof of which is right there on "Better Bad Idea."The main focus of Trophy, and the song that's earned Sweeney the most attention as of late, is "Bottle By My Bed." Co-written with Lori McKenna, the song reflects on the heartbreak of Sweeney watching her friends begin to raise families, while wishing for one of her own and knowing full well her lifestyle isn't exactly conducive to raising a baby.The album, out March 10 on Thirty Tigers, is a beautiful maturation of Sweeney's previous three albums. Its reflections on growing older and slowing down (check out "Grow Old With Me" or "Nothing Wrong With Texas") will make you pause, but only for a moment; the rest of the record is fun as hell (its titular song, "Trophy" is especially good. If this doesn't make you want to love passionately and party with your favorite people until the sun comes up, you have some work to do.
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Photo by Christina Feddersen. Annalise Domenighini is probably on Twitter yelling about something.