“It might be a risk, but I’ll take my chances” is a perfect line to open your record with, and it’s really hard to find better words to describe Maggie Rose’s approach to making music. The Maryland-born, Nashville-based singer has been pushing boundaries within (and outside of) the county genre for a few years now, but 2016 feels like a fresh start. Her newest release, a two-part EP The Variety Show (Vol.1 dropped April 8), sees Rose bringing all sorts of influences to create a truly multi-genre (or “genreless” as she calls it herself) project. While we await the second half of the EP, here are 10 things you should know about Maggie Rose.

She Got Her Start With a Bruce Springsteen Cover Band

“I fell in love with music at a pretty early age," she reveals. "I’d always been a singer. My family was really encouraging of my love of singing and music, but it all officially started when I was 16. I was touring with The B Street Band—the Bruce Springsteen cover band from the Jersey shore. It was kind of a unique experience, being 16 fresh out of Catholic school singing in front of the drinking crowd.” The tour surely prepared Maggie for her college years, although she willingly left her Kappa Kappa Gamma house at Clemson University (she was studying music) in order to sign a record deal in Nashville.

She Likes Her Country Music Diverse

“When I just got to Nashville, I’d write music with country radio in mind," she admits, "and there’s a distinction between what country music is and what country radio is. So once I’ve gotten out of that game, where I’d try to write very specific commercial music, it was very freeing for me.”

She Used to Sing at Weddings

As we’ve been taught over decades of soap operas, anything can go wrong at weddings and the wedding performer usually ends up in the middle of all the chaos. When asked what was her worst wedding experience, Maggie assures us that every wedding she played was indeed beautiful and peaceful. “Right now I’m at that age when a lot of my friends are getting married. And it gets harder when you’re closer to the bride or the groom. You can get nervous when you’re performing in front of people that you know and that will remember that day for the rest of their lives.”

She Loves to Perform to Strangers

“There is one way to never run out of inspiration: to keep going out and seeing different places. It’s also nice to get out of any creative bubble and sing your songs to strangers and see if it connects with them. That to me is the whole point of performing. Making a room full of strangers a little bit more familiar with each other at the end of the show.”

She Took a Clean Slate Approach When Recording Her New EPs

Yes, EPs, as there are two of them. The Variety Show is divided in two “volumes,” and both pack a diverse mix of genres. “If you wouldn’t listen to anything I had previously released, you would be my ideal crowd right now,” Maggie comments. “Even with the title, I don’t want to categorize myself in one genre. A lot of it has to do with growing up in the DC area, where we have a bit of an identity crisis. We’re not North, we’re not South. 10 years ago country wasn’t as everywhere as it is now. And I grew up listening to everything and I make all types of music now. On these EPs there’s pop, dance, collaboration with hip-hop artists and country, too. I’m trying to mirror what’s going on in Nashville with all sorts of music being made there.”

She’s Got a Tattoo of Messaging Pigeons

“I got it when I was in Nashville for two years. I have two sisters, but I’m the only one in my family who moved away. So that tattoo was symbolic for me rebelling and moving to Nashville to make music. I picked messaging pigeons because these birds will travel really far and then report back to the nest. And that’s how I feel about my sisters—we’re kinda spread out but we always connect with each other. I figured I’ll never regret getting a tattoo for such reason. Plus, I really love birds.”

She’s Got a Murder-Your-Boyfriend Song In Her Resume

It’s called “Looking Back Now,” and her fiancé did hear it. “He has heard all of them: murder ballads, revenge songs, and he’s not been scared away yet. 'Looking Back Now' was written by a friend of mine Lisa Carver. She wrote it by herself at night and I always describe it as an epic three-hour-long movie condensed into a song. It’s so vivid. You just feel like you’re there. I love to write but I also believe that a good song is a good song regardless of its origin. I wanted to tell that story. This song was waiting for its moment for 10 years—people were understandably afraid of it. It’s pretty much the opposite of what you should do if you want to get on country radio. But it’s a perfectly written song, so I took it.”

'Vogue' Called Her “Country It Girl”

“I was very flattered. There are so many cool girls in Nashville who are trailblazers musically and stylistically. So to be chosen from what I consider to be the coolest town in America was very flattering. I do think that style for me as much of an important form of self-expression as music. It surely made me blush.”

She’s Got Songs with Mannie Fresh, Dallas Anderson and Big Boi

The super-feature is called “Laid Back.” “We got to do this breezy summer song for my EP. That’s exactly what I’m trying to do with my music. You’re bringing Dallas from country, add the godfather of the Cash Money movement Mannie Fresh, Big Boi (who I listened to in high school with OutKast) and me, an up-and-coming pop-country writer and artist. It’s really unifying and cool. I’m calling the whole sound 'genreless' because we bring something from all of our specialties to this one project.” As Maggie reveals, she’s also got her eyes set on some potential EDM collaborations. A EDM/pop/country fusion? If it worked for Avicii, then we don’t see the reason why it wouldn’t work for Maggie, too.

She Also Sang with Lee Brice

“I got to sing background vocals on Lee Brice’s album. He shot this beautiful video for the one song we’re all singing live. That’s gonna be a big year for me.” It surely looks like it.