In her first release of the year, Noah Cyrus has tapped Vance Joy for her newest single, “Everybody Needs Someone.” The single is the first release from Cyrus post The Hardest Part, her critically acclaimed debut album that dropped towards the end of 2022, where the young musician showed off an experimental foray into bluegrass, country, and alternative pop sounds. 

“Everybody Needs Someone” is a sonic continuation of the alternative bluegrass niche that Cyrus carved for herself on her debut album, complemented by Joy’s stripped back vocals. After exploring the woes of heartbreak on her debut album with songs that Cyrus described as “straight from my heart, my brain, and my body,” her tone on “Everybody Needs Someone” feels like a self-assured progression from the artist.

Singing, “Hopin’, just barely hopin’ / Bleeding and broken from open hearts,” the musician seems to reference her past heartbreak, before opening herself up once more in a hopeful standout for love with, “Take my hand if you can take me as I am / And take my love, if you can love me, that’s enough.” The lyrics here are emboldened by a country-fied melodic ethos that perfectly highlights Cyrus’ raspy and full voice.

Cyrus’ dedication to her Nashvillian roots is a path that is working quite swimmingly for the 23-year-old artist. The space that she has carved for herself in both sound and pop culture is genre-defying to say the least; her personal style is edgy and on the nose with Gen Z fashionable sensibilities (bleached eyebrow girlies, unite!), while her sound is clearly influenced by a traditional country sound. The gray space in between alternative, angsty lyricism and country-inspired production that Cyrus has found herself in is a space where she is clearly flourishing.