The Band Perry On Entering ‘Season Two’ With Obsessive New Anthem ‘PSYCHOLOGICAL’

The Band Perry has entered “Season Two” with original member Kimberly Perry and her husband Johnny Costello now making up the GRAMMY-winning group. Drawing from the energy of their RIAA Diamond-certified hit, “If I Die Young,” they created an obsessive and thrilling anthem titled “PSYCHOLOGICAL.”

Perry tells Country Now that even after all these years, stepping into this new chapter of The Band Perry is so exciting that it keeps her up at night. She explains that a lot of writing and listening to new songs went into figuring out the direction for their sound, and together with Johnny and their team, they agreed that “PSYCHOLOGICAL” was the perfect choice to mark their bold reintroduction to fans.

“It is the next installation of my favorite subgenre of Band Perry Country Music, which is the psycho girl love song,” she shared. “So it just felt like all things nostalgic, Band Perry, but also coming back in 2026 and wanting to not just harken to our past and obviously celebrate that, but also to really embrace where country music is headed and to be a part of that story as well.”

The writers on the song, Clara Park, Grace Tyler and Colton Venner, trusted the husband and wife to bring this song to life and they couldn’t be more honored to get to tell the story. The artists recap a dizzying portrayal of infatuation and obsession as Kimberly Perry’s distinctive voice cuts through a moody piano backdrop to tell a story of a love that’s both unhinged and intense.

A punchy country-rock production bursts with a bold energy, while the singers spiral over the feeling of losing yourself in an attempt to try and fit the perfect mold for someone else. The narrator reshapes themselves by listening to different music, drinking Jack even though they hate it, cutting off friends, and even joking about faking their own death, all to see if their love interest would take notice.

“‘Cause you make crazy seem rational/ I’d say obsession feels natural/ You’re all I want, any hoop, any obstacle/ Boy, you make going psycho logical/ In my head, yeah, you mess all my common sense up/ I know I’m crossing lines that I shouldn’t/ I’m out of my mind, but I don’t need no hospital/ Boy, you make going psycho logical,” they sing on the chorus.

Perry says that even though the chaos of this true story was technically inspired by a moment in the songwriter Grace Tyler’s real life, not her own, she can heavily relate to the narrative and she feels fans will too.

“I’m just so excited because it was a very true story for Grace. She was like, ‘Hey, I had met this guy and then we knew each other very shortly, and then I got a song and I wrote about it.’ I’m like well, I’m a married woman who’ve also been in that season of relationships before finding Johnny, thank God my love story improved…but to also I feel like it was something that I could legitimately and wholeheartedly sing from my perspective. It felt like a really magic crossroads of those two things with this song.”

She also notes that it holds a similar energy to previous death-related tunes, “Better Dig Two” and “If I Die Young.” According to Kimberly, “PSYCHOLOGICAL” originally had a line about the woman winding up at her love interest’s vacation with his family on spring break. However, she wanted to tap into those earlier releases to sing about faking her own death because she felt it was something she would do in her own life.

“I could attest to that,” Johnny joked.

Kimberly explained, “Well, I mean, I wrote ‘If I Die Young’ to just see how everybody would react when I put it out because I’m still living. So yeah, I just feel like it is relatable and for better or for worse, I mean, I have a ring on my hand, so the psycho girl did work out for me to be that devoted/delusional. I think it’s a fine line between the two. And I think that these are real life things that I’ve done and would do again if you ever left me. So don’t ever do that,” she told her husband.

Set to impact country radio on February 17, “PSYCHOLOGICAL” marks the band’s first new music in nine years. The track sets the tone for how they plan to move forward while still carrying on the legacy of The Band Perry and, most importantly, maintaining its original standing as a family band. With her husband by her side, she is fulfilling her dreams of embarking on this musical journey together and is even open to the idea of bringing their son into the group one day as well.

“I just feel like I’ve gotten to live so many seasons with The Band Perry. It’s been one of the great loves of my life since I was a teenager…[I], of course, enjoyed those seasons with my brothers and we love the hell out of every minute that we were on stage together. To get to come back in season two with my husband in the band, which has always been a dream of mine to have my person in the band with me, to be building this legacy for our son. And if he ever wants to come and play drums in a few years, he’s welcome to, it feels like such an important thing to keep intact.”

With Johnny’s rock background, he fits perfectly into The Band Perry’s signature blend of country and southern rock that, in his opinion, can often evoke a bit of head banging.

“There’s some really fun moments. And I think there’s the element that Kimberly keeps telling having a family band, there’s a level of being family that you just…on stage, there’s a little bit of like, ‘oh, I know where you’re going with this.’ It’s what a seasoned band gets over time as well, but you’re just like, “Oh, I know where you’re going with this setup. Okay, cool. I’m going to hit this out of the stage.” It just makes a real fun element playing live music.”

The duo is currently playing their full catalog out on the road, making sure to highlight “all the hits that everybody loves,” along with a few deep cuts from the band’s earlier albums.

“I feel like I’m just really trying to take so much care about being recognizable and really championing what brought us to the dance in the first place and also just loving and being perfectly honest with where we are now, what we’re thinking about, what we love to sing about, and how we love to play on stage,” Kimberly added.

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Beginning this weekend, they will embark on the Psycho Rodeo Tour with their first stop being three back-to-back nights across Colorado from February 13-15. They will return to Nashville’s Grand Ole Opry next Friday, February 20 and then continue the trek through August.