Country singer-songwriter Brittney Spencer had not long gotten off the stage in the summer of 2024 when a familiar, but unexpected face poked around the corner of her dressing room.
She was part of the Outlaw Music Festival tour, which boasted the likes of Willie Nelson and Bob Dylan at the top of its stacked bill. Former Led Zeppelin powerhouse vocalist Robert Plant (with Alison Krauss) and John Mellencamp were also part of the tour, which she opened for seven dates in late July and early August.
She'd only released her debut album, My Stupid Life, in January of that year, and so the tour was a huge opportunity for her. But naturally, she never expected to interact with the big-name stars tasked with charging out that septet of gigs. Yet she did. Bob Dylan was her surprise visitor.
Writing on Instagram as she announced her upcoming four-fate run opening for Dylan and Jimmi Vaughan, Spencer reflected on that pinch-me moment.
“Two summers ago, Bob Dylan came into my dressing room after our set at Outlaw and told me he really liked my songs,” she recalls. “He was so detailed about it all that I could actually barely handle it, lol.
“He asked for my number,” she develops. “I wrote it on a napkin and gave it to him. He didn’t call. I think this is his way of calling now, and I’m picking up on the first ring.”
She'll play four consecutive dates, starting in Pittsburgh on July 12, and culminating in Guildford six days later. The shows follow a tour with Martin signature artist, Jason Isbell, and appearances at the CMA and ACM Awards. She’s also played with Bruce Springsteen and Miranda Lambert, with her star in the country world rising fast.
Born in Baltimore, Maryland, but Nashville-based for nearly a decade and a half. As a teenager, the Chicks were her gateway into country music.
“They did something that made me really love songs that told stories,” she told DIY in 2024. “I knew I had to find a way of doing that, too.”
Having had a diverse musical upbringing, from singing gospel to going to jazz clubs, she was never going to be purely country. And as a black female artist, she's vying to break down barriers in the genre.
“It's hard, I always feel pushed back being a woman. There's a tension,” she tells the Beyond the Boys Club Podcast. I constantly feel like a black, plus-size woman in Nashville, and it makes me think that who I am has a limit on it and how far I can go.
“But I have to feel hopeful,” she adds. “I’ve got nothing to lose, and if I do make it, that’s an anomaly in itself. I just don’t want it to be.”
Her tour with a legend of the genre, and his backing to boot, will certainly help cast rocks at the glass ceiling. But a wider look at the guitar scene, from Diamond Rowe’s rise to be Jackson’s first black female signature artist, to Fatoumata Diawara becoming the first woman of color to receive an Epiphone signature guitar back in January, shows progress is being made.
