Photo by Harper Smith.
Like many of us, Maren Morris and Ryan Hurd experienced a major change of pace over the past year and a half.
The singer/songwriters married in March of 2018 and have been steadily touring their respective careers ever since (and prior). But then COVID hit, and the world (and concerts) stopped. Ironically, the forced slowdown couldn’t have come at a better time for the couple: Morris gave birth to their first child, son Hayes, on March 23, 2020. Since then, they’ve been acclimating to being a family of three. And while Morris always imagined raising her son on the road, she says the time at home with her family has been life-changing in the very best way.
“It was such a lucky thing for us to be home with our son for the first year of his life. It’s been so good for us to have him in a time where you couldn’t go anywhere. We couldn’t have planned that,” she says. “Everything changes [when you have a baby]. There are things you will no longer think of without thinking of your kid first, even going out to dinner for the night, it’s like, OK, what do we do? You see everything through a new lens and it’s amazing.”
However fateful, getting used to life off the road wasn’t easy for the couple, both of whom found themselves in the midst of an identity crisis with so much time on their hands.
“I would say every person who does this has this struggle of what is my identity. Because music is great and it’s amazing and it can be your vocation and your passion, but as an identity, man, that’s a hard thing if who you are is your job,” says Hurd. “That’s been a struggle, having to go through If I don’t have this, who am I? And it’s very cool when you get over a hump to realize, OK, this is what it’s like to be home. This is what it’s like to have people that I deal with that don’t do the exact same thing that I do.”
“I’ve been touring since I was eleven years old. So, to have that subtracted from the equation indefinitely—and I had an emergency C-section—I was definitely enduring an identity crisis,” says Morris. “I think that, for me, the biggest gift of this year, aside from my son, aside from becoming closer to my partner, has been being forced to find something outside of music that makes me feel worthy of being here and my worth to my friends and my family.”
The two have found some of that in their new hobbies. Hurd has been playing golf with his friends, while Morris has picked up tennis. They’ve also started cooking together—a journey that Morris’ fans have been witness to via her social media platforms. “We’ve just been finding things outside of music that make us happy. I think it’s been really healthy for us,” says Morris. “For me, particularly, being a mom postpartum through a pandemic, I had to find something within that freefall that would ground me.”
Despite the time off the road, it’s been a successful year for both artists. In April, Hurd’s hit “To a T” went Platinum. That same month Morris took home trophies for Female Vocalist of the Year and Song of the Year for her smash “The Bones” at the ACM Awards. (Incidentally each wrote their song about the other—swoon!)
“I think just letting go for a second has brought even more to my life. I’ve stood on stage accepting awards for a song like ‘The Bones’ more often than any other time in my career when I was hammering it,” says Morris. “Awards aren’t the point, but I’ve been able to have the most celebrations in this past year of not touring.”
The two have also fallen deeper in love with songwriting. “We’ve written some of our favorite songs ever this year—without feeling like we had to because it was work. You’re sort of like, well, we’re writing a song today and this feels so inconsequential to what I see on the TV every single day. We can’t even leave our house,” says Hurd. “But when you take the pressure off yourself, great things start to happen. I haven’t felt that need to ‘write something great today’ in over a year, and it’s turned into some music that I really liked for myself.”
“It’s tapped into a part of me that I think only existed before I got a record deal and there was no ceiling on my dreams. There was no expectation,” says Morris. “When I was writing songs like ‘My Church’ and ‘80s Mercedes’ I didn’t give a fuck what anyone thought. I didn’t care who I played it for. I just really loved it. This is the first time in five or six years that I’m writing songs where I just don’t care if anyone likes them, because I love them so much.”
“It’s been one of the most creative seasons we’ve ever had—separately and together,” says Hurd. “I got to be a part of so many songs with Maren and I haven’t gotten that regular creative time [together] in five years.”“Because we haven’t seen each other that much,” notes Morris.The two also had a chance to release their first-ever duet, “Chasing After You.” The sexy ballad tells the story of a couple who just can’t stay away from each other. (Perhaps an ironic premise for two people stuck in a house together for the past year.) The sultry song is a perfect sonic fit for the duo and many listeners would be surprised to know that they didn’t pen it themselves.
“We’ve written a ton of songs that we could have done an official first duet with, but I feel very secure in my songwriting abilities, and with this song it really was, I can’t write anything better than that. I owe it to these guys and to the whole Nashville community to cut it,” says Hurd. “This is a song that our friends wrote that we heard, and everybody knew the demo. Other artists were going to record it and for some reason, didn’t. At some point it just fell to me. I can’t believe that we got the opportunity to record it—just because of how great of a song it is and how many other artists at one point had dibs.”
The song is accompanied by a steamy video and the couple performed an equally passionate version onstage at the ACM Awards. But while they’re seriously sultry in their shared performances (and adorably affectionate throughout our interview), they’re quick to point out that PDA isn’t always their thing.
“We were laughing through the entire thing,” says Hurd. “The producer wanted us to kiss at the end of the performance, and I just saw Maren and started laughing. She’s like, I would never do that.” “We are not actors. I was like, I’ll kiss you, but I’m going to laugh about it,” she says. “There’s got to be a little levity here if we’re going to do this. Luckily, he’s the only person I would be that steamy with onstage, so we were like if we’re going to do this, we’re going to do it.” “It’s easy when you’re married,” says Hurd, “because, yeah, we do that every day.” “Not for public consumption,” Morris laughs.
In addition to the duet, Morris has been working on her own new music—the songs that will make up her third album. In March the couple spent time in Hawaii (where Morris’ producer lives) and the slower pace of the past year found its way into her music in more ways than one.
“It’s a lot more relaxed because I’m a more relaxed person than I was three years ago,” says Morris. “I’m really happy. I think the confidence of becoming a mother and being married and being off the road and finding myself without [the feeling that] I have to be constantly hustling and to have any worth in this world I have to show people how busy I am. This record is reflecting the opposite: I’m not busy! I’m home every day and I’m writing songs about my life and my friends and my baby and it’s all wrapped up in there.”
And while Morris continues to ready her next album, the couple is planning some family fun this summer—with one-year-old Hayes in mind. “We planted an herb garden and that’s my little baby. And Maren started cooking and it’s been really fun to hang out and do that together,” says Hurd. “We really love to be on the water, so we’re going to try and do some boating.” “We need to get Hayes some swim lessons because I want him to be able to swim ASAP,” says Morris. “I really do feel like we’re in a sweet spot and it’s kind of awesome. We have a really cool stride right now,” says Hurd. “We’re starting to sound like normal people.”