Lambert revisited that era during an Oct. 1 appearance on The New York Times’s Popcast. She said she and Underwood made it through at least seven years when country music seemed to be releasing only male artists. “It’s like, ‘Wow, this is really off-kilter a little bit,’” she recalled. Then came the line that captured the strain behind the joke: she and Underwood should get a ribbon for surviving it. “That was a hard time, honestly.”
Her remark landed because the imbalance was more than a feeling. Country radio charts offered a stark measure of how difficult it had become for women to get heard and why Lambert’s playful “ribbon” is also a pointed piece of history.
On the Billboard Country Airplay chart dated Dec. 8, 2018, the top 20 included no women a first since the chart began in 1990. The same thing happened the following week. Carrie Underwood’s “Love Wins” was the highest-charting song by a woman, at No. 22.
The chart offered a striking snapshot of a broader debate about women’s access to country radio. In 2015, a radio consultant’s analogy comparing women artists to tomatoes in a salad and men to lettuce drew widespread criticism. The remark became an enduring symbol of a system in which women were treated as an addition to the format, rather than as artists with equal claim to its airwaves.
Lambert did not need to consult a chart to notice the imbalance. “There were only two girls for so long,” she said on Popcast. The shortage was evident not only in radio rankings but also in the everyday experience of working as a country artist.
Lambert and Underwood had already collaborated on “Somethin’ Bad,” their 2014 duet, which reached the top 40 of the Billboard Hot 100. But a hit together did not mean they regularly shared stages. Lambert said they rarely toured together because so few women were included on the same lineups.
The two did not even see each other’s Las Vegas residencies until about three years ago, she told the hosts. “We weren’t playing the same shows ever.”
That separation mattered. Touring can create a sense of community among artists who encounter the same pressures and routines. When there are few women on a bill, the experience can become isolating especially when the people who might understand it best are rarely nearby.
For Lambert, the difficult part was not just competing for airplay. It was having almost no one who had lived through the same stretch to call after a great night or a bad one. Her comments describe the loneliness behind the numbers: being visible as one of a handful of successful women, while lacking a wider network of peers moving through the same industry at the same time.
Lambert said the difference was noticeable over the course of her own career. When she arrived in 2004, she recalled, a group of women came out around the same time. By the 2010s, it felt as though there were no women at all. A few managed to break through; many others waited.
Her account is a personal view, not a claim that women disappeared from country music altogether. But it captures the distinction between making music and having a reliable path to mainstream exposure. Women could be recording, writing and performing while still finding it difficult to reach radio audiences or land on major touring bills.
That is why the image of Lambert and Underwood “surviving” the era resonates. They were among the women who remained highly visible, but their success did not erase the scarcity around them. If anything, being one of so few could make the imbalance harder to ignore.
Lambert now sees more ways for artists to find listeners. Streaming and social media, she argued, allow people to hear new voices before a radio programmer decides whether they belong. “You don’t have to love them all, but at least there’s a way to hear them. And then you decide.”
That does not mean every barrier has disappeared. But it does mean artists can begin building audiences through channels beyond traditional radio gatekeepers. The country landscape now includes prominent women such as Lainey Wilson, Kelsea Ballerini and Megan Moroney, alongside many other artists who are no longer isolated exceptions on a concert bill.
Lambert has also taken an active role in supporting the next generation. She helped write “Choosin’ Texas” with Ella Langley, Luke Dick and Joybeth Taylor during a writers’ retreat; the song was completed in about 45 minutes. Lambert co-produced the track and served as an executive producer on Langley’s album Dandelion. According to Billboard, “Choosin’ Texas” spent 23 weeks at No. 1 on the Hot 100, setting a record for the longest run at the top of the chart.
The collaboration makes Lambert’s comments about the current generation more than an observation from a distance. She is participating in the work of bringing new artists into the spotlight—writing with them, producing them and helping shape the records they release.
Lambert’s own next chapter was also part of the news around her Popcast appearance. On Oct. 2, she released Crisco, which opens with “Snakeskin Boots,” a duet she said was written with Langley in mind.
Lambert described the song as “kind of Thelma and Louise if they didn’t drive off the cliff” a lively image for a collaboration between two artists with a shared appetite for bold country storytelling.
The song also offers a contrast with Lambert’s recollection of the years when she and Underwood rarely appeared on the same shows. Now she can collaborate directly with another prominent woman, help develop her album and imagine a musical partnership as a creative opportunity rather than a rare occurrence.
Lambert’s ribbon is not a literal award. It is a way of naming what it meant to work through years when women struggled for space on country radio and on tour lineups. Her joke carries warmth and solidarity, but it also points toward a serious question: what does success mean when artists have few peers who share their experience?
The chart history gives the story its clearest symbol. For two weeks in 2018, not one woman appeared in country radio’s top 20. Lambert’s memory of the years around that moment supplies the human context: limited company onstage, limited room on playlists and the loneliness of having few people to call who understood.
Today’s country scene offers more routes for women to reach listeners, and more women are appearing on prominent charts and bills. Lambert’s comments are not a declaration that the struggle is over. They are a reminder of how recently the imbalance felt normal and of why greater visibility, collaboration and community matter.