Miranda Lambert, Ashley Monroe, and Angaleena Presley are Pistol Annies, and the August 23rd release of the trio’s 10-song debut album, Hell on Heels, found its beginnings one night on Miranda’s couch, and it now stands to become one of this summer’s top, not-to-be-missed, way-cool album experiences. As we look ahead toward the Tuesday release, the Annies talked with us, sharing some insights into what to expect from the album, as well as a bit about how they came together and what it’s like to be Pistol Annies. (AUDIO INFO BELOW) 

• Hell on Heels will be available digitally everywhere on Tuesday, with the physical CD available exclusively at PistolAnnies.com.
• You can pre-order your copy of Hell on Heels online now at PistolAnnies.com or on iTunes, right !
• Get to know your Annies! There’s “Hippie Annie” — Ashley; “Holler Annie” — Angaleena; and Miranda is “Lone Star Annie.” Check out the story behind the names at PistolAnnies.com!
• Did you know…?  Ashley and Miranda have been longtime friends, and together with Travis Howard, they wrote Miranda’s gorgeous number-one hit, “Heart Like Mine.”
• There’s a Pistol Andy! The Annies honored Miranda hubby Blake Shelton with the title after he co-wrote the album track “Family Feud” with the trio, but outside of that one, every other song on Hell on Heels was written solely by one or more of the Annies!    

  Miranda Lambert talks about the origin of Pistol Annies. (:23)
“Sittin’ on the couch, I’m at my farm in Oklahoma, Ashley and I were writin’ songs, and we wrote a couple songs that are now on the record that sort of sparked this idea of bein’ in a girl band. Called Ang — and she had introduced me to Angaleena’s music — and just loved it…fell in love with it. And so we asked Ang, ‘You want to be in a girl band?’ I mean, literally, it just went from the couch to this.”

  Pistol Annies explain a bit of the personal dynamic to the trio. (:41)
Miranda: “Ash and I don’t have any sisters — we just have brothers — and Ang does have a sister, so she knows how to relate to us like a sister.”
Angaleena: “We had to learn. We had to learn how to deal with each other ’cause it’s like, ‘It’s my shirt! It’s mine!'”
Miranda: “‘Cause we’re so close…”
Angaleena: “Even just little things…”
Miranda: “I mean, we fight like sisters, but we also make up like family does, which is gets over it pretty quickly and moves on and loves you more than they did before.” 
Angaleena: “And the dynamic works because they’re kind of in their little group ’cause they’ve been friends forever and ever, and then I kind of came along, and I’m kind of like the older sister who was off at college and has moved back home, and so…”
Miranda: “She has her private reflection time…”
(laughter)
Angaleena: “I require a lot more alone time than they do, but it just works.”

  Angaleena Presley shares some of the influences who have helped to shape Pistol Annies. (:32)
“I think all of our major influences are those classic country artists. Like, Miranda basically worships Merle [Haggard], I worship Loretta [Lynn], and Ashley basically worships Dolly [Parton], and so, that’s what we grew up listening to, and that’s what we love. I think that in our solo careers we’ve expressed ourselves, but there’s power in numbers, and I feel like with this record we’re just brave to the power of three. So, hopefully, we did something great and everybody loves it.”

  Miranda Lambert says that capturing the kind of sound Pistol Annies wanted to achieve sometimes meant that less is more. (:18)
“Some of the songs were easy to capture that sound, some of ’em weren’t so much, you know? There was a time where, like, ‘Trailer for Rent,’ for instance, is one of the most simple tracks, and it’s four chords, and it took a lot for us to get the band to really understand, okay, you know, we want it to be as simple as possible. There’s nothin’ fancy about the song. There’s nothing fancy on the track.”

  Ashley Monroe talks about the music of Pistol Annies. (:30)
“We didn’t really set any intentions is the kind of cool thing and kind of scary thing about it is we just wrote these songs. We didn’t think about it. We just wrote ’em. And then, you know, the band and the producers matched the music surrounding it to the songs and to the lyrics of the song, so it just happened like that naturally, which is amazing because that’s…we’re all inspired by 30-years-ago country. That’s what we’re all influenced by, and so, the fact that we created somethin’ that hopefully can be compared to that is a huge, huge compliment.”