Kacey Musgraves has fired back at critics of her provocative tour prop.
The 38-year-old country star addressed the backlash head-on during her September 1 show at Madison Square Garden in New York, making clear she has no regrets about the oversized disco-ball installation that has dominated social media since her Middle of Nowhere tour launched in Chicago late last month. The prop, which resembles male genitalia, became an instant flashpoint for divided fan reactions online.
“My manager didn’t tell me no,” Musgraves exclaimed from the prop during her performance, according to fan footage from the venue. She leaned into the controversy with a string of jokes that same night. “This is what it looks like when no one tells me no,” she told the sold-out crowd.
“It takes a lot of balls to get up here and do what I do every night,” she continued. “It takes two gigantic, anatomically correct sparkly balls. I’ve actually got my Nana in the house tonight, and she always told me, ‘Honey, if you’re gonna do something, do it big, do it sparkly.’ Nana, is this what you had in mind?”
The singer’s unapologetic stance has only intensified the online debate that erupted once tour footage began circulating on X, formerly known as Twitter. Reactions have ranged from amusement to irritation. “this is nuts,” one user posted. Another wrote: “She’s trying so hard to go viral.” A third chimed in: “Yeah, I really don’t like that.”
Yet defenders have been equally vocal. “I love her so bad!” one fan wrote. Another echoed: “She’s the funniest person in the world,” while multiple users crowned the Grammy winner an “icon.”
Musgraves has built a career on candor, a trait she extended to her personal life earlier this year while promoting Middle of Nowhere. She revealed that the album emerged during the first extended period of singledom in her adult life, following her split from writer Cole Schafer. That breakup came after her three-year marriage to Ruston Kelly ended in 2020.
“I feel like most people are trying to convince you how much they’ve got going on in that department, and I just wanted to let people know how little I had going on,” she told the outlet about her romantic life. “It can get really comfortable and easy to stay that way, because you start feeling really protective of bringing transient energy in. Like, ‘I’m really peaceful right now. This may or may not make anything better’. But then you’re like, ‘Ugh, but I wanna have some fun.'”
She added that she and others in similar situations would start “weighing out whether it was worth it.”
The Kelly divorce had been announced jointly through representatives to PEOPLE in 2020. “We’ve made this painful decision together,” the former couple’s statement read. “With heavy but hopeful hearts we wanted to put our own thoughts into the air about what’s happening. These kinds of announcements are always met with scrutiny and speculation and we want to stop that before it even starts.” They described a “divine reason” for their union and a “soul connection that can never be erased.”
The disco-ball prop controversy marks the latest instance of Musgraves blending humor with spectacle onstage, a combination that has defined her live shows since the tour’s Chicago kickoff. Her manager’s apparent approval, which she highlighted at Madison Square Garden, suggests the installation will remain a fixture rather than a one-night provocation.
The Middle of Nowhere tour continues through the fall with upcoming North American dates.