Let's Hear It For The Girls: Sara Evans, Jo Dee Messina and Jamie O'Neal All Plan Upcoming Albums

Earlier this week, we unveiled new projects for five guy country artists. Now it's the ladies turn. Three of country music's brightest tenured ladies artists have all announced new projects including Sara Evans, Jo Dee Messina and Jamie O'Neal. Sara Evans' Slow Me Down will hit 3/11, Jo Dee Messina's Me will arrive on 3/18 and Jamie O'Neal's Eternal will also be released on 3/18.

Sara Evans has collaboarted with country icon Vince Gill, Isaac Slade of The Fray and Gavin DeGraw on her new album, Slow Me Down. The album comes over two years after the release of Stronger, her second Billboard Country Album Chart #1. The title track has been steadily climbing the charts with the companion video featuring NASCAR great Carl Edwards in heavy rotation on both CMT and GAC. Slow Me Down is Sara Evans at her finest, with her signature powerful vocals that will serve as a reminder of why she has had a level of success reserved for few. Evans co-wrote three of the albums eleven-tracks and some of Nashville’s finest songwriters are represented on Slow Me Down. A virtual who’s who of songwriters on the album include Dave Berg (Keith Urban, Reba McEntire, Blake Shelton), Shane McAnally (Florida Georgia Line, Kasey Musgraves, Kelly Clarkson), Karyn Rochelle (Trisha Yearwood, LeAnn Rimes, Ronnie Milsap), Sarah Buxton (Keith Urban, The Band Perry, Gary Allan), and Shane Stevens (Lady Antebellum, Kellie Pickler, Montgomery Gentry), amongst many others.

Jo Dee Messina's long wait for her new album- following a bitter feud and divorce from Curb Records- will come to an end when the singer/songwriter's new full-length album Me comes out on 3/18. The album title reflects what Messina says is her most personal album to date as she wrote or co-wrote many of the songs and will release it on her own newly established label, Dreambound Records, with distribution by eOne Music. For the first time in her career, she is able to boldly do things her own way and pave her own path to success. Following her departure from her old record label, Messina began reflecting and started putting pen to paper. The feisty song “Not Dead Yet” was born. “I had been listening to the naysayers around me and thought, ‘I have so much to offer now that I'm free of the restraints I had with my label.’ I then had a conversation with my friend and co-writer saying, ‘I have so much left to do, so much left to say. Goodness! I'm not dead yet!’ And that is how the song was born. It talks about how if I listened to the small thinkers and naysayers, I might as well throw in the towel. Music is my life, it's a part of who I am. I'm not ready to give up that part of my life. Hell, I'm just getting started!”

Another one of her favorites is “A Woman’s Rant.” “This song had many more verses,” says Messina. “It was written in a few minutes. My youngest baby wouldn't sleep longer than two hours. One night I was sick and could barely move so I tried to wake up my husband to get the baby, but I couldn't get him to budge. After feeding the baby, burping him, changing him, I was wide awake. That's when I went downstairs and wrote ‘A Woman’s Rant.’ It's literally a day in the life of me. Ha! The fans chose ME as the album title. I think it fits because this record explores many different sides of who I am. The song came about through a conversation with one of my co-writers, Kathie Baillie of Baillie & The Boys, who has a grown daughter. I was feeling the stress of trying to be everything to everyone and asked her how she did it. There is a part of me that thinks when I look in the mirror, I should see Wonder Woman. When I see me, it terrifies me. Can I really pull off all the things I have to be to so many? I don't know. We'll see. This song gives folks a peek at the vulnerable side of me which isn't shown that often.”

Jamie O'Neal's Eternal album will largely be a covers one. She has interpreted 11 classic hits from Patsy Cline, Bruce Cockburn, Deborah Allen, Larry Gatlin, Emmylou Harris, Kris Kristofferson, Loretta Lynn, Juice Newton, Connie Smith and others. “Eternal is a little different for me,” Jamie said. “I grew up listening to these songs and was shaped by the artists who originally made them famous. It was an honor and a challenge to record such wonderful songs. I had so much fun recording this whole album and was a little sad when it was finished, but now I get to finally release it, and I can’t wait for everyone to hear it!” It includes one non-cover song written by she and her father/manager, Jimmy Murphy, called “Wide Awake.” “It’s a funny song I wrote with my dad as an ode to everyone who gets to sleep with a ‘snoring moose’ every night,” Jamie says.