Country singer Brooke Eden credits Mickey Guyton for inspiring her to come out as gay.
During an appearance on Apple Music’s “Proud Radio with Hunter Kelly”, Eden opened up about recently announcing her same-sex relationship with girlfriend Hilary Hoover after introducing fans to Hoover as her “soul mate” and admitting they “kept our love a secret for 3.5 years.”
Posting a video on Instagram in January, Eden wrote: “I started by posting pictures of us without captions. Then started using vague words to describe who she was to me. Finally, a little over a year ago, I got comfortable enough to tell y’all who she really is @hilary_hoover —the love of my life.”
On what inspired her to formally make her announcement, Eden credits ACM-nominated Guyton’s vulnerable two songs “Black Like Me” and “What Are You Gonna Tell Her”.
“I’m just sitting there speechless,” she says after listening to the tracks. “Like, ‘Mickey, you’re finally saying all the things that you’ve been feeling for so long,’ and we’ve been friends for a long time and Mickey’s like, ‘I, as a Black woman, need to speak up and you as a queer woman need to speak up.’ And for so long, we’ve been silenced.”
She continued: “And I feel like that night, she felt like she needed to encourage me to be myself and because she was so empowered to be herself and wanting to empower me to be me. And it was just the beginning of those conversations with my label who had already encouraged me to be me and just getting this music out that was fully, authentically me.”
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Eden recently caught up with ET Canada and opened up about the current state of inclusivity in country music and re-introducing herself as a proud member of the LGBTQ+ community
“Love is love. And our love looks the same as everyone else’s except we’re just two girls who fell in love,” she says. “It’s incredible to see other people seeing themselves within our story. And finally feeling like they can be represented by another LGBTQ member.”
With Eden’s announcement and T.J. Osborne recently coming out as gay, the singer says she is starting to notice change within the business.
“I definitely see our genre realizing that we need to step up. You know, we’re in control of who gets played and who gets seen. And it’s amazing to see my friend Mickey Guyton, whose one of the best artists that I’ve ever heard sing, getting the recognition that she deserves. And T.J. Osborne being able to come out and do his thing.”
Eden’s latest release “Sunroof” is out now and the music video stars her girlfriend Hilary.
