Back in 2015, Kacey Musgraves, country singer and prominent figurehead of the Yeehaw Agenda, ended up on the cover of The Fader. Though absolutely a great fit, she was an unexpected choice—country music stars don’t often end up crossing over into Fader world. “She’s not your usual country star,” Duncan Cooper wrote, “nor is she anything but.”
And that stick-to-your-guns quality might actually be why Musgraves has had such crossover appeal lately. She’s born-and-bred country—a native Texan who writes lyrics like “Mind your own biscuits, and life will be gravy”—but has the sort of pure-fun pop culture appeal that someone like Dolly Parton has. In her cover story with Glamour, out today, she wears a brilliant orange and pink Marc Jacobs ensemble with a single Anita Ko earring. It isn’t yeehaw couture yet it couldn’t look more natural for Musgraves’ metamorphosis from cult favorite to all-around mainstream star.
The rise of Musgraves’ star has also coincided perfectly with a newfound cultural appreciation for country-western Americana—yeehaw, if you will. She’s been dubbed the Yeehaw Queen by fans who now bring posters proclaiming such to her shows. Now, people are stanning her online in the way typically reserved for pop stars like Ariana Grande or Lady Gaga. “Step on me yeehaw queen,” reads one particularly internet-parlance tweet.
“It makes me happy, that in some strange way there’s an affinity for something that’s a big part of me,” she says in the Glamour interview. “I can’t get rid of the country; it’s just in my DNA.” Musgraves is simultaneously celebrating the kitschy symbology that people are ironically (and also genuinely) embracing right now—the sort of rhinestone-and-fringe bedazzled things she grew up with in Texas—while somehow making it feel different than the country culture that may not appeal to everyone. The Yeehaw Agenda she espouses is also aligned with things that make the wild west, fuck-it attitude appealing. Instead of country conservatism, it’s smoking weed, writing a country album that also isn’t a country album, and singing “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” with Paramore’s Hayley Williams.
Never before has the western-wear aesthetic blended so perfectly with this specific cultural moment—Cardi B’s wearing hot pink chaps, Solange is shouting out Houston in snakeskin cowboy boots, Pyer Moss paid beautiful homage to contemporary cowboys, and Instagram accounts like @theyeehawagenda are paying tribute to cowboys and cowgirls of color.
Meanwhile, Musgraves is welcoming everyone to the “yee yee club, bitch”. She’s introducing all of us—even country music fans—to a different kind of country, one that sometimes sounds like ABBA and tours with Harry Styles. “I love country music with everything that I am,” she said during her Grammys speech, when she walked away with four awards including best album of the year. “And I’m very proud to be able to get to share my version of that with the world.”