Filtered through the sheen of self-care, Maren Morris’ post-divorce life seems perfectly suited to an Instagram carousel on “cut,” a steely synth-pop track off her new album Dreamsicle. She’s getting plenty of sleep, going to therapy, hitting yoga four times a week, and being “present with every friend.” You’d never know the heated truth until the song, like its title, cuts behind the scenes. “Honestly? Fuck!” she sings, loosening her voice from its corset, as keyboards fizzle up into the atmosphere and explode like fireworks.
Morris and singer-songwriter Ryan Hurd, who have a son together, finalized their divorce in January 2024. Later that June, she came out as bisexual. After she spent portions of her last album, 2022’s Humble Quest, singing about (and co-writing with) Hurd, Dreamsicle could easily have been a sharp-tongued rebuttal to all that pillowy tenderness. But Morris has insisted it isn’t a capital-D divorce album littered with shards, like fellow Texan Kacey Musgraves’ star-crossed. Instead, it feels closer to Miranda Lambert’s self-inquiry following her 2015 split from Blake Shelton. On Dreamsicle, Morris comes across like a guest attending the house party of her new life, snooping through the medicine cabinet—and catching revealing glimpses of herself in the mirror.
Among her discoveries are novel sides to her sexuality. Morris warns a no-strings attachment against developing feelings on the swaying “bed no breakfast,” but the lyrics sound like an awkward Airbnb listing: “A five-star review is expected/I check every box on your checklist,” she sings coyly, backed by breathy, swooning vocals. The more interesting flirtation unfurls with Naomi McPherson (from indie-pop band MUNA) on the ’80s-inspired “push me over.” Over hair-metal guitar riffs and staggered R&B rhythms, a fitting frame for Morris’ aerodynamic vocals, she details the electric thrill of finally being with a woman. “We can test out my hypothesis,” she demurs.
Morris has consistently eschewed attempts to categorize her music. But where 2019’s Girl felt unfocused, Dreamsicle is more cohesive, as though Morris were pulling varied outfits from a single closet. After working with pop powerhouse Jack Antonoff on “Get the Hell Out of Here,” off her 2023 EP The Bridge, she reunites with him for three tracks, including the acrobatic, blues-tinged “people still show up” and the coursing indie-rock closer “holy smoke.” But the complexity of those songs isn’t consistent across the album, and when Morris leans into familiar pop tropes, like the moody synths on “because, of course” or the fairy-dust whimsy of the title track, it feels like she’s following someone else’s style cues, instead of relying on her own instincts.
While Dreamsicle avoids too much navel-gazing about the past, Morris is a quick draw on bouncy opener “lemonade,” co-produced by the Monsters & Strangerz and Isaiah Tejada, taking aim at both her ex and her own habit of trying to sweeten his sour behavior. But she chases the metaphor far past its fencing, landing on the silly jibe, “Gotta pour you down the drain.” The more compelling version of that wounded emotion shines through “this is how a woman leaves,” a country-pop ballad that gives Morris’ voice space to expand into a swaggering snarl.
If there’s any love to be found in the wreckage of her marriage, it turns out to be with friends. “grand bouquet,” another Antonoff production, wraps a reflective acoustic guitar around Morris’ quiet delivery as she gratefully acknowledges her friends’ presence in her life. Morris may have once treasured the red roses of romance, but on Dreamsicle, she turns her attention to the wildflowers that surround her—and are only now coming into bloom.
