Singer songwriter and self-styled Dive Bar Beauty Queen Ashland Craft teases new music after performing at Country 2 Country (C2C). 

Ashland Craft released her debut album, Travelin’ Kind in 2021 to much acclaim. The release gained her a place on CMT’s Next Women of Country Class of 2021 and Pandora’s Country Artists to Watch in the same year. The following year, she supported Ashley McBryde on her tour. McBryde features on Craft’s newly-released remaster of her song Yard Sale, a song about a woman whose ex-lover never came back to shift his stuff out of her house, so what does she do? She has a yard sale! The song also features Mae Estes, who provided a surprise appearance for the audience who were lucky enough to watch Craft on the BBC Radio 2 stage at London’s O2 on C2C weekend.

South Carolina native Craft first came to the attention of country music lovers when she appeared on The Voice. More recently, she released another album, Dive Bar Beauty Queen, and joined Luke Bryan on his tour last year.

What was your performance like? What could you say about it?

Energetic. That is the biggest word I can find because the crowd were ready to have a good time. They were hooting and hollering and that’s the kind of crowd I love. So I had a blast. This is my first time ever in Europe or literally anywhere outside of the US. 

How did you find the atmosphere and the crowd here at the C2C?

They came ready to party. I mean, even in Berlin and literally every C2C location, everybody has been so ready to listen to country music. They’ve been receptive, and they just listened, which actually, it’s funny, because that’s such a surprise, but they’ve just been so accepting. 

You’re actually the fourth person that said that today. The difference between the audiences here in Europe, compared to America, is that people will actually listen and you can see that they’ve actually taken the time to learn your songs. Is that what you have found as well?

Funny that it’s like unusual for us, but I think because of where we live in Nashville, it’s probably a little bit more… prevalent? Like, everybody’s used to that kind of scene there, and I don’t know, just a lot of times, you play writers rounds or shows, and everybody’s chattering and talking to each other, but here, in every single show they’ve been locked in.

I noticed you were meeting some fans off the stage. How has it been to be able to meet some of your fans?

Mind blowing. I think when I released my first record, Travellin’ Kind, four, five-ish years ago, I had already had a lot of UK supporters that were just ready for me to come over here. I was ready to come over here, but was never just able to make it happen until now. So it’s amazing seeing them also know the old album as well as the new album. That’s all I could ever ask for.

And what have you got coming up next?

I just did a release with Ashley McBryde and Mae Estes on Yard Sale, and then so we’ve got two more collabs coming off the latest record, Dive Bar Beauty Queen. Super excited for that. I think it’s just helping funnel the attention back to that record, and I truly think it just deserves a little bit more of a spotlight. I think everyone was just so chaotic at the time, so we’re finally getting back to just giving that record to more love. And then after that, I’m just trying to tour and stay on the road as much as possible, and then hopefully just continue to release more music.