After spending months promoting his next project, Morgan Wallen has officially released his highly-anticipated fourth studio album, I’m The Problem. Boasting 37 tracks, this collection, out now Friday (May 16), could be considered more of an ambitious undertaking than its predecessors — 2023’s One Thing At A Time and 2021’s Dangerous: The Double Album.
While Wallen has undeniably shattered countless records with his two previous extensive full-length offerings, I’m The Problem, already enjoyed early success with its preview tracks — the title track, “I’m The Problem,” the closer, “I’m A Little Crazy” “Lies Lies Lies,” “I Ain’t Comin’ Back” featuring Post Malone, “Love Somebody,” “Smile,” “Just In Case,” and “Superman.” Several of those cuts shot up to the No. 1 spot on various charts, including Billboard’s Country Airplay and Billboard Hot 100 charts.
I’m The Problem is perhaps the most introspective album out of Wallen’s tremendous catalog to date, as he has come to a point in his career where he is looking inward following a series of controversies that has plagued him over the years. Needless to say, Wallen isn’t trying to justify his wrongdoings, nor is he trying to run from his mistakes. On this album, he is open, honest and deeply vulnerable, showing folks that while he’s at the pinnacle of his career, he is just as human as anybody else.
“I have been a problem, for sure, and I’ve got no problem admitting that,” Wallen shared in a bio for his album. “But there are other sides to me as well. I’ve spent the last year really trying to figure out, ‘Do I still want to be the problem? Is it time to move past that phase in my life?’ I think it is, and that might be the last time I get a chance to honestly say something like that.”
He added. “I’ve always just kind of been a little bit of a troublemaker. There’s no way around that. But I think anyone who knows me also knows that that’s not all I am.”
At 32 years old, Morgan Wallen has experienced many challenges being in the public eye. He has had to navigate through various changes in his life and career. Perhaps the most important one? The one that saw him become a father to his now 4-year-old son, Indigo “Indie” Wilder Wallen. Before releasing I’m The Problem, the country crooner shared its third track, “Superman” — a vulnerable and thoughtful dedication to Indigo that plays out as a letter of hope from a father, who wants nothing more than to protect his son and the relationship they share.
“One day you’re gonna see my mugshot/ From a night when I got a little too drunk/ Hear a song about a girl that I lost/ from the times when I just wouldn’t grow up,” Wallen sings in the opening lines of the track he penned alongside Ryan Vojtesak, John Byron, Blake Pendergrass, and James Maddocks, later sharing the chorus. “No, I don’t always save the day / But you know for you I’ll always try / I do the best I can, but Superman’s / Still just a man sometimes.”
“I’ve tried so many times to write a song like that for him, and it always fell flat,” Wallen said of “Superman” during a recent appearance on Theo Von’s This Past Weekend. “I also didn’t want to write a song to him that was all sappy and slow, and just what you would expect a dad’s son song to be. That song has been written plenty enough.” He even admitted that the song brought him to tears upon first listen. “On the way home I was listening to it and started crying, and that’s the first time that had happened with a song for him. So that I kind of knew,” He added of “Superman,” which was the last song that made the album.
It’s no secret that Wallen has been one to put a large quantity of tracks on his albums, and because of that, he has tackled countless subjects in the past. Driven to showcase even more layers to his artistry and of himself, Wallen dug deep lyrically and pursued the complexities and opportunities of new sounds while remaining true to his country roots and getting his feet wet on the production side of things.
“A lot of the concepts and things we said were a little more difficult with this album,” he admitted. “We were trying to dig deep on things and trying to find new angles. And I feel like we did that. I just spent three, maybe four months, completely focused on writing and getting this album done, and it’s amazing what you can get done in that period of time.”
One subject that pops up frequently is the idea of finding redemption by turning to his faith. Wallen leans into his spiritual side on tracks like “Kick Myself,” “Genesis,” and “Revelation.”
“Been talkin’ to a doctor / been talkin’ to the Lord / Cut off a couple people / That don’t hear from me no more,” Wallen sings on ‘Kick Myself’ doing his best, while realizing his bad habits are hard to break, he sings: “Everybody on the outside / It’s easy lookin’ in / Probably think I’m doing great like / Take a look at him / He’s gonna straighten up now / He’s finally walkin’ lines / I ain’t lying / I was probably doing fine before I kicked the bottle…”
“Revelation,” meanwhile, finds Wallen yearning for simpler times while searching for the light. “I’m a long, long way from home / But I can still see it through the smoke / I wish I still sang to Jesus like the way we used to do at church,” he sings. “….I’m a man on the run / With a hand on the gun / I’m a father and a son who needs that Holy Ghost,” he sings.
Comfortable enough with his main producer, Joey Moi, who has worked on his previous albums, the superstar hitmaker and reigning CMA Entertainer of the Year found himself reinventing the wheel so to speak of his musical style that most folks have become familiar with. Tracks like “Smile,” “I’m A Little Crazy,” “Drinking Til It Does” — built around stunning piano melodies — are a little more subdued with a softer, stripped back feel, allowing Wallen to settle into his gritty vocals that take front and center while also displaying his impressive range and falsetto.
“Man, I love singing like that,” Wallen noted of those kinds of songs on the project. “I think that’s when I sing the best. I guess I was just trying to highlight that, trying to highlight what I’m actually most proud of about myself. [Joey] and I have developed such a good relationship over the years. I can say, ‘Hey, I need to turn this down, or I need to do this.’ We’ve just developed a trust in each other. He listens to me, but he’s also honest when he disagrees with my choices.”
With showcasing his vocals on bare-bones tracks, Wallen, in the same sense, doesn’t struggle to keep the integrity of the sound he is known for. On several tracks, he leans into his hip-hop influences, while on others, he integrates indie rock elements. But, the storytelling aspect radiates through every song on the robust 37 track album.
He hooks the listener with topics of young love, transient romance, and wild experiences in songs such as “20 Cigarettes,” “LA Night,” “Crazy Eyes,” and “Miami,” a track that finds the East Tennessee native putting a very unique spin on the popular Keith Whitley track, “Miami, My Amy.” He then transitions from ramblin’ man to songs of someone who desires to settle down with someone special like the waltz-tinged “Missing,” the laid-back “TN,” a tune that truly showcases his talents as one of the best songwriters in the industry right now, and the regretful “Falling Apart,” reminding listeners of how loneliness can weigh on someone who wishes to lay down roots.
“Turns out I needed you / And the leaving you wasn’t half as smart as I thought it was / ‘Cause my life’s in pieces now / And I’m seeing how / What we had was ‘bout as good as it comes / Now I know better / ‘Cause without your arms to hold me together / Baby, I’m falling apart,” Wallen croons throughout the chorus of “Falling Apart,” written with Blake Pendergrass, Josh Thompson, and Ryan Vojtesak.
“Jack and Jill,” a standout track on the large endeavor, pulls from the popular nursery rhyme of the same name, and reimagines a tragic story where Jack and Jill are in a tumultuous, doomed relationship. Penned by Jacob Hackworth, Jared Mullins, Ned Cameron, the tune shows a different side of Wallen as he delivers a story from an outsider’s perspective, one of the few tracks where he does that on the record.
“No they didn’t have it together, but together they had it all,” Wallen sings, grabbing listeners seconds into the track. “This is the story of Jack and Jill how their whole world came tumbling down / Heartbreak kills, Jill got on the pills and Jack couldn’t get off that Crown.”
Features Five Collaborations: Post Malone, Tate McRae And More
On I’m The Problem, Wallen makes room for several collaborations, joining forces with frequent collaborators like Eric Church on “Number 3 and Number 7,” ERNEST on “The Dealer,” HARDY on “Come Back As A Redneck” and Post Malone on the previously released “I Ain’t Comin’ Back.”
One surprising cut on the record includes his first duet with a female artist: “What I Want” featuring pop superstar and “Greedy” singer, Tate McRae. “My sister showed me Tate’s music a while back, and I just think she’s cool,” Wallen says. ”Her range is so good. She’s able to get emotions across in such a wide range of keys and vocals. I really love her low tones.”
With effortless vocals, a soaring anthemic sound, and stunning harmonies that blend Morgan Wallen’s world-renowned gravelly voice with Tate McRae’s captivating “cursive singing” style and falsetto, “What I Want” emerges as a standout radio-ready track and delivers the powerful female duet fans have long craved from Wallen.
“That song wasn’t written with her specifically in mind, but we sent it to her, and she didn’t ask us to change the key or anything. She was a really great person to work with, as far as features go. I can’t say enough great things about Tate, and there’s nobody really like her to me,” he added. “I know she takes pride in writing as well. I’d expect her to be around for a while. I think she’s got something unique, and I’m proud to have her on here.”
Wrote Most Of The Project On His Turkey Farm
For much of I’m The Problem, Wallen turned to a place where he could escape, feeling inspired to reflect at the turkey farm he purchased two years ago. The hunting camp has already proven to be home to plenty of memories. And while Wallen didn’t buy the property specifically to pen songs for the album, he did recruit some of the four-dozen songwriters featured on the project to write songs with him at the farm.
“Being out in the woods helps me a ton,” Wallen, who has hunted every season since 2020, continued. “Just the camaraderie with my friends and knowing that I’m safe in those places is one of the main ways I stay sane…”
“At my farm, we wrote the song ‘I Got Better,’” he added of the track that features a relaxed melody with the click of drumsticks following Wallen’s signature vocals. “You can see it in the first line: ‘Everything’s still pretty much the same ’round here.’ One of our neighbors had just killed a piebald deer, and we’re like, ‘Damn it, man.’ We had been watching this thing on camera for like two years, waiting until it was going to be a good, mature buck. That’s why I followed that line with, ‘Neighbors still shooting all of next year’s deer.’ I mean, if it wasn’t for that farm, and for things like that, I wouldn’t even know what that means, you know?”
Another track that aligns with Wallen’s time soaking in the rural relaxation is the blue-collar driven “Workin’ Man’s Song” — a stadium-ready anthem for the working class community, paying tribute to the hard work ethic of individuals who are just trying to make a living.
“Tryin’ to make a livin’ Isn’t supposed to feel like dyin’ / Lookin’ for my golden ticket / Can’t find no silver linin’ These days 9 to 5 feels more like 25 to life and / Tryin’ to make a livin’ / Isn’t supposed to feel like dyin’ nah (oooh)Supposed to feel like dyin’ nah (oooh),” he sings.
Wallen, who co-wrote 22 of the 37 tracks on the album, may have spent time at his hunting camp collaborating with his friends, but he has celebrated the album, hosting a series of listening parties at his Nashville establishment, Morgan Wallen’s This Bar & Tennessee Kitchen, where folks got a preview of the never-before songs from the album.
All in all, the topics on I’m The Problem cover love, family, redemption, fatherhood, loneliness, hard lessons, life — something for everyone.
“A lot of people say to be present, and it’s hard, but I feel like I’ve been better about that this past year or so in my life,” Wallen said. “It’s important for me to make the time for things that really matter to me. I feel like there’s a lot of stuff that I haven’t said yet in this record, which I’m really, really proud of.”
This isn’t just an album—it’s Wallen’s boldest narrative yet. I’m The Problem finds him carving his own legacy, refusing to chase trends in favor of authenticity. The album dives deep into his core, anchored by powerful songwriting and a dream team of collaborators who help shape each story. Throughout the extensive project, he proves that he’s not just a chart-topper—he’s a storyteller of a generation.
I’m The Problem’s release coincides with the launch of the inaugural Sand In My Boots Festival, taking place in Gulf Shores, Alabama, May 16-18. After that, Wallen will kick off his 2025, I’m The Problem Tour, named after his latest album. The 20-date trek begins at NRG Stadium in Houston, Texas with back-to-back sold out shows on June 20 and June 21.
For more information on Morgan Wallen’s new album and his upcoming tour dates, visit his official website.
