Hey, is that Abby from Yellowstone? No! It’s Lainey Wilson, and Bell Bottom Country is here to tell her story.
Lainey Wilson: Bell Bottom Country, now streaming on Hulu in conjunction with ABC, follows the singer and songwriter during her first big arena tour in 2023, a year that also saw the Louisiana-born Wilson win a Grammy for her record Bell Bottom Country and take home the Country Music Association’s top award for Entertainer of the Year. It’s been a whirlwind, Wilson tells ABC’s Robin Roberts in a sit-down interview, and fittingly, that’s also the name of her upcoming fifth studio album. But she’s not slowing down. “If somebody tells me I can’t do it,” she tells Roberts in Lainey Wilson: Bell Bottom Country, “hold my beer. Watch this…”
Opening Shot: “A lot can happen in a year, and I am proof of that. I went from playing a show in Alabama to 87 people, and next thing you know, I’m headlining my first arena show.” As she looks out at the rows of seats during soundcheck, Lainey Wilson says that moments on the big stage always remind her of who she is and where she came from.
The Gist: With her new record on its way out, Lainey Wilson is leaning into the media blitz. Bell Bottom Country is streaming on Hulu, and with the Roberts connection, getting play on Good Morning America. She just performed her new single on The Voice. And while basically everybody who isn’t Taylor Sheridan is in the dark about the future of Yellowstone, Wilson made a memorable turn on the show, playing a version of herself in the first part of season five. The CMA’s newest Entertainer of the Year has also put her name on a bar in Nashville, something a repeat winner of the award is doing, too.
So everything’s coming up Lainey. But Wilson’s doing her damndest to stay grounded. “You can’t think that everybody’s gonna love ya,” she says in Bell Bottom Country. And she recognizes how fickle and fleeting the music business can be. But for now, she’s out here trying to live up to the work ethic instilled in her at a young age. The documentary special travels back to Wilson’s hometown of Baskin, Louisiana, where she grew up on a farm, was a flag girl in the local rodeo, and first learned a few chords on the guitar from her dad. Before she was ten years old, she was writing her own songs. And soon enough, she was also finding ways to perform, including starring as Hannah Montana at kids’ parties and old folks’ homes. “I’d open for myself,” Wilson tells Roberts in Bell Bottom, playing a few originals before she donned the blonde wig and belted out “Nobody’s Perfect” through her portable sound system.
As Wilson continues her arena tour in 2023, Bell Bottom Country includes more flashbacks, covering her 2011 arrival in Nashville, the years of scrambling and hustling that came after, and her first breaks toward the exposure, which would lead to the breakout success of the single “Things A Man Oughta Know” in 2019.
