She grew up in Lindale, Texas (population 4,700)—so her songs about small towns hit close to home. “It’s your classic Friday night football, churchgoing town,” she says. “It’s good to keep you humble too. People in Lindale are proud of me, but they’re also like, ‘Whatever, you’re still Miranda.’”
She’s got taste in songwriters. Lambert has recorded material by Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, Patty Griffin and—on her new album, Revolution—Julie Miller and John Prine.
She gets her way. “My school didn’t have a choir and I didn’t make cheerleader my sophomore year,” she says, “so I went to the school board and got a petition signed and proposed that we get a choir, so we got a choir. And they still have a choir to this date.”
She’s basically a zookeeper. “I’ve got five dogs, three cats, two donkeys, three horses, two mini horses, four goats, a bunch of cows and a bunch of chickens. Oh, and two pot-bellied pigs.”
She has her own wine label. Among other Lambert-approved varietals, the Red 55 Winery offers a blush called Electric Pink and a blanc du bois called Kerosene, which is—according to online tasting notes—“pleasingly tart with softening hints of pear and ripe apple.”
She tweeted this: “When life gives lemons, make hard lemonade!”
She also tweeted this: “So today I got pistol and a new bikini at the same store. Bass Pro rocks!!!”
And her boyfriend, country beefcake Blake Shelton, tweeted this: “You know how little dogs kinda run in place when they get excited?… That’s Miranda at McDonald’s.”
Even though she carries a gun, plasters winged six-shooters on her merchandise and sings songs called “Gunpowder & Lead” and “Time To Get A Gun,” she does advocate gun safety. “My dad was a private investigator so I’ve been around guns all my life,” she says. “I started shooting a gun when I was five years old. If you don’t have the knowledge, don’t have a gun. That’s where the accidents happen.”