Hope Hull, AL · country

Ella Langley

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Alabama sass with outlaw leanings — 'you look like you love me' turned a duet into a career.

Ella Langley, born Elizabeth Camille Langley in Hope Hull, Alabama, grew up in a musical family with two brothers and a sister and was homeschooled in Montgomery through seventh grade. She sang in Southern Baptist churches as a child, and after her grandfather's death her father had his guitar restrung for her at fourteen; that night she taught herself Bob Marley's "Three Little Birds."

She played her first public show at a high school talent show in Hope Hull in 2016, then worked local bars and festivals around Alabama through her teens. Langley enrolled at Auburn University to study forestry, joining Phi Mu sorority, while continuing to write and perform on the side before graduating and moving to Nashville.

In Nashville she worked the local writers'-round circuit, picked up early support from independent country outlets, and signed a publishing deal with Sony Music Publishing Nashville in 2021. She made her Grand Ole Opry debut in February 2023, signed to Sony Music Nashville and Columbia Records the following week, and released her debut EP, Excuse the Mess, that May.

Her songs stay plainspoken and conversational, built on traditional country instrumentation and turning often to drinking, small towns and relationships gone wrong, sung in a hard-edged Alabama accent she's never tried to soften. That approach carried into 2024's Hungover, whose "You Look Like You Love Me," a duet with Riley Green, and "Weren't for the Wind" both topped the Country Airplay chart.

Langley has also written for other artists, including five songs on Elle King's Come Get Your Wife. Her second album, Dandelion, arrived in 2026 and debuted at number one on the Billboard 200, led by "Choosin' Texas," which topped the Hot 100, Hot Country Songs and Country Airplay charts simultaneously, a first for a female artist.

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