Return of a ‘Hero’: Maren Morris’ Breakthrough Gets Expanded for Its 10th Anniversary
Almost exactly a decade after catapulting into the upper tier of country music, Maren Morris will celebrate the album that put her there with a new deluxe edition.
HERO: A Second Wind expands Morris’ major-label debut HERO for its 10th anniversary with a generous nine tracks – nearly double the length of the original record. In addition to three previously available tracks on a Target-exclusive deluxe edition, the set (available on CD, 2LP and digitally) offers two previously unheard songs, “We Can’t Be Friends” and “Hard Liquor and Soft Rock,” and demo versions of four album cuts. All formats of the reissue are available June 26.
It’s an incredible full-circle moment for one of the genre’s most notable – yet most underrated – voices, a singer/songwriter with a distinctive Texan drawl in her alto, a biting wit behind her pen and a penchant for dipping her boots into different genres and styles. An aspiring artist since her teens (she released three independent albums between 2005 and 2011), Morris eventually found success after fellow Texas luminary Kacey Musgraves encouraged her to move to Nashville; after arriving there, she started working as a songwriter, penning tunes that Tim McGraw and Kelly Clarkson would record. Her publisher encouraged her to keep her most personal material for herself, and after meeting country-pop producer Michael Busbee, began work on a project of her own.
After Columbia Nashville won a bidding war for her work, Morris hit pay dirt with HERO, a bitingly funny and instantly catchy album packed with singles like the Top 10 country hits “My Church,” “I Could Use a Love Song” and “Rich.” The LP debuted in the Top 5 of the Billboard 200, and “My Church” took home a Grammy for Best Country Solo Performance. (She scored a further three nominations, including Best Country Song, Best Country Album and Best New Artist.) But Morris’ next decade of moves was hard to pin down: in 2018, she scored a Top 10 pop hit with “The Middle,” a dance track by producer Zedd and electronic duo Gray. Her next albums Girl (2019) and Humble Quest (2022) incorporated elements of pop and R&B, even while Morris joined Brandi Carlile, Amanda Shires and Natalie Hemby in female country supergroup The Highwomen. And in 2023, after using her platform to fundraise for causes like the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and advocacy groups for trans rights (and loudly criticizing country acts like Morgen Wallen and Jason Aldean for their conservative views), Morris announced her intentions to leave the formal country music “machine”; 2025’s Dreamsicle was released by Columbia proper, and featured collaborations with Jack Antonoff, singer Julia Michaels and alt-pop trio MUNA.
But Morris is returning to her roots this summer: July sees her embark on the dreamGIRL Tour, including a special date at the Red Rocks Amphitheater, where she’ll be backed by the Colorado Symphony Orchestra and joined by her bandmates in The Highwomen (who just released a surprise live album last weekend). HERO: A Second Wind will be in stores just before that trek kicks off, on June 26 – and fans can pre-order it below. (As an Amazon affiliate, we earn from qualifying purchases.)
HERO: A Second Wind (Columbia Nashville, 2026)
CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
2LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada / Official Store (Red Vinyl/Signed)
- Sugar
- Rich
- My Church
- I Could Use a Love Song
- 80s Mercedes
- Drunk Girls Don’t Cry
- How It’s Done
- Just Another Thing
- I Wish I Was
- Second Wind
- Once
- Bummin’ Cigarettes
- Company You Keep
- Space
- We Can’t Be Friends
- Hard Liquor and Soft Rock
- Sugar (Demo)
- Company You Keep (Demo)
- I Wish I Was (Demo)
- Drunk Girls Don’t Cry (Demo)
Tracks 1-11 released as Columbia Nashville 88875 16885-2, 2016
Tracks 12-14 released on Target exclusive deluxe edition – Columbia Nashville 88985 32645-2, 2016
Tracks 15-20 previously unreleased
