Follow Your Arrow

"Follow Your Arrow" is a country song constructed as a logic trap. Written with Shane McAnally and Brandy Clark, it lays out every contradictory expectation placed on a young Southern woman — be pious but not preachy, be modest but not frigid, don't drink, don't smoke, don't sleep around, but also don't be boring — and concludes that since you'll be judged regardless, you may as well do what you want. The arrangement is deceptively sweet: chiming acoustic guitar, banjo rolls, a hand-clap shuffle, and a bright, singalong chorus that sounds like a church-picnic tune. Kacey Musgraves delivers it deadpan, with an unbothered clarity that makes the provocations land as common sense rather than manifesto. In 2013 country radio balked at the lines about kissing girls and rolling up a joint, and the song's slow-burn cultural life happened largely outside the format — it won CMA Song of the Year anyway. The genius is that the melody is so disarming you're humming it before you register what you've agreed to. Suited to a car full of friends who've all been told to behave, or a morning when you've decided to stop apologizing for something.