The night before one of the biggest concerts of his career, Orville Peck tried to end his life.
It was 2023, and Peck was scheduled to headline a sold-out show at the Theater at Madison Square Garden, the opening night of his Bronco tour. Instead, he overdosed alone in his New York City hotel room, heartbroken and, by his own account, hopeless. His team found him the next morning.
"I was in one of the worst places in my life, for sure," Peck said in an interview with Rolling Stone, speaking from backstage at the Grand Ole Opry ahead of his debut performance there. "I was a bad addict, a coping alcoholic. And I had this spiral moment, where I went back to my hotel and tried to take my life. It was a big turning point for me, with a lot of realizations to come. It was something that needed to happen."
He played the show anyway. He wore his fringe, leather, and mask and performed a 19-song set. Then he canceled the rest of the tour and checked into rehab.
That sequence of events forms the backbone of his forthcoming album, Mule, due September 18. The record opens with a bluegrass hymn performed by Emmylou Harris, Allison Russell, and Noah Cyrus, who Peck describes as "the three witches of Macbeth of my country music story." The song imagines what would have happened if Peck had not woken up that morning. From there, the album moves forward in time, tracking his breakup, his addiction, his time in treatment, his sobriety, and a broader reckoning with identity.
Since his debut album Pony in 2019, Peck has built a following among queer listeners and country music fans who felt excluded from the genre's mainstream. He performs in a mask, uses a stage name, and has leaned on metaphor throughout his career. Mule is a departure. The writing is more direct than anything he has released before.
Peck's team gave him an ultimatum after finding him in the hotel room: get clean, or he would be on his own. He chose rehab.
The album arrives as Peck made his debut at the Grand Ole Opry, a milestone for a performer who has spent years operating on the edges of country music's institutional centers. Whether Mule reaches listeners beyond his existing fanbase remains to be seen, but the record represents a significant shift in how one of country music's more guarded performers has chosen to present himself.
Mule is out September 18.
