The Surprising Story Behind Kacey Musgraves' Song 'Mother'

Speaking with Taste of Country in 2018, Musgraves went on to explain more about the experience of writing "Mother," sharing how vulnerable the song pushed her to be. Delving more into the emotional moment she had while on acid, she described receiving that seemingly simplistic text from her mother that ended up meaning a lot to her in the moment, conjuring specific childhood nostalgia. "She's like, 'You'd be so proud of me, I've stopped biting my nails, I've let them grow out,'" Musgraves explained, stating that she then told her mom she was proud. "The way she responded just wrecked me. She was like, 'Ugly old hands, I can't keep the East Texas dirt off of them.' And I started thinking about my mom's hands and the fact that she's created all this beautiful art; she's held me with these hands. You recognize your mom's hands more than anyone's, and mine even look like hers."

"It did make me really nostalgic for past, present, future and my family," she went on to say. "I just started thinking about all this crazy hurt that's going on in the world, it was really heavy, and I was missing my mom at the same time. I started thinking about the cycle of mothers and the fact that I was sitting there in Tennessee missing my mom who was sitting there in Texas missing her mom. It just goes on and on."