Despite Taylor Swift maintaining she’s a country singer, she’s more Britney Spears than Dolly Parton. Kacey Musgraves, however, is singing country music like her idols once did.

"I learned how to yodel. [I] figured out it was something I could do," says Kacey. "From there it kind of became my thing until I got old enough to know it wasn't really resounding with people in my age bracket. It was something that got me attention with older people when I was younger." Musgraves came to people’s attention when she was just 18. She appeared on the 2007 season of Nashville Star, but exited the competition after just three weeks. In that same year, she released an independent album recorded with East Texas musicians; it was funded by her grandparents. "You might find it in the 'nobody wants this' bin. There's not very many copies around." Musgraves as mastered the art of yodeling; something which is attracting nearly as much attention as her obvious musical talents. "If I had a show in Chicago, they would drive me there, 14 hours," she says. "So they never made it feel impossible to branch beyond whatever little reality I grew up in," she added.

But while the experience of yodeling for crowds was fun, she really wants to concentrate on her songwriting. "I wanted to resonate with people my age so that's when writing clicked on in my brain—realizing I could say something for myself and not just sing other people's songs."