Canadian artist Shania Twain, notorious for adding a pop flair to traditional country music in the ‘90s and early 2000s, released a new album “Queen of Me” via Republic Records on February 3rd of this year. Twain, the best-selling female country music artist of all time, has made an astounding and triumphant return to the music industry following her 2017 album release, “Now”. Twain’s new album has been heavily anticipated after her Netflix documentary “Shania Twain: Not Just a Girl” was released in mid-2022.

“Queen of Me” marks the sixth studio album release of her vast career and is filled with 12 uplifting songs like “Giddy Up!” and “Waking Up Dreaming.” This light-hearted album rings in the new year with a powerful message for overcoming obstacles and being your own hero.

Legendary for her Grammy-award winning songs, “Man! I Feel Like a Woman!” and “You’re Still the One,” Twain’s approach to her new album focuses further on blending the contemporary pop sound with her country music roots. “Queen of Me,” written during the COVID pandemic in isolation, is an ode to healing past the health struggles she has overcome in the past two decades. Twain was diagnosed with dysphonia and Lyme disease in 2003 which caused her to nearly lose her singing voice completely. After her outspoken decades-long battle with the illnesses and the fight to regain her voice, she fell ill to COVID during lockdown in 2021. Despite strict isolation, she developed COVID pneumonia which led her to be airlifted to a hospital and treated with plasma therapy. With fear that COVID would be the final straw, she began to write “songs that make me feel like dancing and put me in a good mood.” During her recovery, she wrote the song “Inhale/Exhale AIR”, inspired by this life-threatening struggle.

In an interview with NPR, when asked if she felt she was having sort of a second wind, Twain states, “I would say I’m in a celebratory frame of mind, and I don’t want to waste air and take anything for granted.” After coming so close to losing it all, she found solace and healing in the escape of what she knows best: songwriting. Whether “Queen of Me” contains Grammy-award winning tracks or not, her legacy speaks for itself, and dedicated fans are delightfully pushing the album to the top of charts worldwide.