Kelsea Ballerini released “Two Things” on Friday, the most recent track from her upcoming album, Patterns, out Oct. 25.
On the heartache ballad’s chorus, Ballerini sings: “Two things can be true/I’ll love and hate you/I’ll be your best and your worst day/I’ll be your blessing and curse, babe.” The artist hinted at the track and its upcoming video the day before with a clip showing her looking through a window at the countryside before it cuts to a view of a city skyline. The snippet also hinted at the song’s line, “I love New York City, but I can’t stay at the Carlyle anymore,” and flashed a shot of Ballerini on the steps outside the historic hotel.
In August, Ballerini dropped the upcoming LP’s second single, “Sorry Mom,” which she said in a statement was about “chasing dreams, walking away from school, losing my virginity, walking away from college.” The track followed her collaboration with Noah Kahan, “Cowboys Cry Too” — the song released back in June and is also set to appear in Patterns.
Her forthcoming project will be Ballerini’s first full-length album since 2022’s Subject to Change and follows her 2023 EP, Rolling Up the Welcome Mat, which earned a Best Country Album nomination at the 2024 Grammy Awards despite its 16-minute run-time.
The singer will celebrate her new LP a few days after its release with a special performance at New York’s Madison Square Garden on Oct. 29. ”The whole time I was making this album, I was visualizing and dreamscaping ways to bring it to life for our live show,” she said in a statement. “It was something I couldn’t wait more than five days after its release to do.”
When discussing Patterns with The Associated Press, Ballerini said that “people probably expect this really happy-go-lucky, love, mushy, gushy record from me. That’s not the case.” She added, “And I’m really proud of that. It would have been easy to, I think, just collect the really beautiful parts of my life that I’ve dusted off and found the last couple of years. But that’s not the fullness of my experience.”