Kacey Musgraves Drops Playful New ‘Mexico Honey’ Video

Kacey Musgraves is closing out summer exactly the way you would hope she would. The eight-time GRAMMY winner released the official ‘Mexico Honey’ video on Wednesday, and the new Kacey Musgraves video is a sun-drenched, cinematic little love story filmed entirely on location in Mexico. It is romantic, it is beautifully shot, and at one point it features a parrot. More on the parrot shortly.

Inside the Kacey Musgraves ‘Mexico Honey’ Video

Directed by Running Bear, the duo of Alexa Stone and Stephen Kinigopoulos, the video unfolds like a very good trip. It opens with Musgraves lining her lips in the rearview mirror of a car, a small detail lifted directly from the song’s own lyrics. From there we land in a neon-lit karaoke bar, where she takes the stage in a pair of hot pink shorts that deserve their own credit in the roll.

The rest is pure atmosphere: desert drives with her hair streaming out the window, wandering through the streets of a border town at night, and a jungle pool tucked beneath a waterfall. Throughout, she shares easy, unhurried moments with her onscreen love interest, the sort of quiet scenes that make a romance feel lived-in rather than staged.

The Menagerie That Steals the Show

Here is where the video earns its charm. Musgraves has assembled what can only be described as a cast of animals. There is a panther. There is a python, which winds around her in the waterfall pool. And right before the second chorus, the video cuts to a wonderfully unexplained shot of Musgraves holding a brilliantly colorful parrot.

It is a genuinely funny visual non sequitur in the middle of a very pretty video, and it is exactly the kind of wink that has made Musgraves one of the most beloved artists of her generation. She has never been interested in taking herself entirely seriously, and the parrot is proof.

Why the Kacey Musgraves ‘Mexico Honey’ Video Is a Love Letter to Mexico

For Musgraves, the video carries more weight than a standard visual accompaniment. Her team describes the clip as “just as much a tribute to the captivatingly beautiful country of Mexico as it is to the passion and experiences that have inspired her there.”

That framing tracks with the song itself, which folds Latin musical elements into her sound and stands out on an album otherwise steeped in the dust and warmth of East Texas.

The ‘Middle of Nowhere’ Album Behind It

‘Mexico Honey’ comes from ‘Middle of Nowhere,’ Musgraves’ sixth studio album, which debuted at No. 1 this spring to considerable acclaim. Produced alongside longtime collaborators Daniel Tashian and Ian Fitchuk, the record earned placements on year-end best-of lists from Billboard, Elle, Esquire, Rolling Stone, NPR and Variety.

The album takes its title from an actual sign in Golden, Texas, the unincorporated town of fewer than 300 people where Musgraves grew up, which reads: “Golden, TX: Somewhere in the Middle of Nowhere.” Its guest list is a country fan’s dream, with collaborations alongside Willie Nelson, Miranda Lambert, Billy Strings and Gregory Alan Isakov. The lead single, ‘Dry Spell,’ arrived as a sharp and very funny piece of self-aware songwriting, and ‘Mexico Honey’ quickly became a fan favorite on the tracklist.

Musgraves heads to North American arenas this fall in support of the record. You can watch the ‘Mexico Honey’ video now on her official YouTube channel, or below, and stream the single across all platforms.

Panther, python or parrot. Choose wisely.