Megan Moroney isn’t just a country artist with a knack for turning heartache into honky-tonk anthems—she’s also the ultimate Belieber. In a rollicking new Rolling Stone profile, the 27-year-old Georgia-born singer-songwriter confesses her lifelong devotion to Justin Bieber, a crush so potent she once handcrafted shirts for his concerts emblazoned with Kesha lyrics rebooted as Bieber propaganda. (“Dudes are linin’ up ’cause they hear we got fever / But we kick ’em to the curb unless they look like J Bieber.”) It’s the kind of fangirl flex that screams “future country legend with a pop-star soul,” and Moroney’s got both in spades.
Moroney, whose sophomore album Am I Okay? (July 2024) solidified her as Nashville’s reigning “emo cowgirl,” is already plotting her third LP—and she’s dreaming bigger than ever. “We wrote the crap out of these songs,” she declares, channeling the meticulous angst of a songwriter who treats every syllable like a dagger to the heart. One track, the swoon-worthy “You for Me,” is begging for a duet partner. Her pick? The Biebs himself. “Maybe he would feel that way about Hailey,” she muses, referencing the song’s ode to all-consuming love. “I know he does.”
It’s a full-circle fantasy for Moroney, whose music thrives on bridging eras and genres. Her 2023 debut Lucky positioned her as a millennial answer to Taylor Swift’s diary-entry country, but Am I Okay? cranks up the drama like Red (Taylor’s Version) with a whiskey chaser. “It sounds like Lucky’s cooler older cousin that can drink,” she jokes, leaning into the album’s bolder guitars and bruiser ballads. Tracks like “I’m Not Pretty” and “No Caller ID” pivot between tear-in-beer vulnerability and swaggering kiss-offs, a duality Moroney sums up as “empowering and confident, but also… girl, I’m a mess.”
Yet beneath the confessional lyrics and TikTok-ready hooks, Moroney’s secret weapon is her unapologetic fandom. That homemade Kesha-Bieber mashup shirt isn’t just a cute anecdote—it’s a manifesto. Like Swift rewriting Speak Now with Paramore riffs or Kacey Musgraves sneaking psychedelic sighs into countrypolitan twang, Moroney thrives where pop and Nashville collide. She’s the friend who’ll shotgun a White Claw while sobbing to Purpose, then write a song about it that makes stadiums scream.
And scream they will. With Am I Okay?, Moroney’s aiming for arenas, crafting songs meant to echo off cheap seats and cheaper decisions. “I wrote it with the intention of playing bigger venues,” she admits, and you can hear it in the way “You for Me” pivots from whispered verses to a chorus begging for lighters (or iPhones) in the air. It’s the sound of an artist who knows heartbreak isn’t just personal—it’s communal.
So where does Bieber fit into all this? For Moroney, he’s the North Star of pop-country alchemy, proof that sincerity and spectacle can coexist. “Some days I wake up feeling so confident,” she says, “and other days I’m trying not to text him.” She’s joking (probably), but that push-pull—between fan and phenom, between crying in the parking lot and owning the stage—is what makes Moroney the most relatable superstar in Nashville.
Justin, if you’re reading this: The “You for Me” demo is waiting. And Megan’s still got the shirts.
