LAS VEGAS — There’s a line in Miranda Lambert’s “Vice” that had her on the verge of tears when she talked about it backstage at the Academy of Country Music Awards on Sunday night (April 2):

 

I wear a town like a leather jacket/When the new wears off, I don’t even pack it.

 

“That’s my favorite line on that song,” Lambert said. “Maybe one of my favorite lines on the whole record.”

 

The day she wrote that song had been a particularly hard one, she recalled backstage after she’d won both female vocalist of the year and album of the year.

 

“It was right in the middle of a lot going on in my life. To me, country music is about truth and about what’s really going on,” she said. “Whether it’s happy or sad or somewhere in the middle.

 

“And so for me, in the past couple of years, it’s happened to be a little more sad than happy. But now it’s moving in another direction. I’m really glad that people can relate to an emotion like that.”

 

Two of her producers joined her onstage to accept the album of the year award for The Weight of These Wings, and she was singing their praises backstage.

 

“Glenn Worf’s played on every one of my records and been a co-producer, and Frank Liddell has been producing me for every album that I’ve ever made,” she said.

 

“And we’ve grown up together and gone through stuff together, and it’s sharing those moments with real people who have real emotions. We can all sort of grab on to each other’s and use it for our art. And that’s such a blessing.”

 

Even though Lambert keeps on winning at a time when she feels ready to pass the ACM torch, she talked about how honored she is to be the one leading the way for whoever comes next.

 

“I’m really so thrilled that I can still help lead the charge for women in this business at any level — that I can keep pushing forward, and make way for other women to do the same thing,” she said.

 

“But I’ll be happy as a clam when it’s somebody else’s turn. I really will.”