Gretchen Wilson recently won season 13 of The Masked Singer as her character Pearl. She stopped by The Bobby Bones Show for the first time to share her experience and talk about her career over the years.

Wilson was filming The Masked Singer for a month admitting that the days were very long and strenuous. Any time she walked around set she had to wear a hoodie, cover her entire body, and even had a visor taped on the inside that she could only see through these small eye holes. She wasn't able to tell anyone that she was on the show besides her publicist and make-up artist who were there with her, she had to keep things very close to the vest. She shared some behind-the-scenes from the experience that most people wouldn't think about like having to get her hair & make-up done every single day because she could get unmasked at any moment and had to be ready. They do have the contestants record tracks for a backup plan in case things hit the fan, but the whole show is actually live. She didn't know who any of the other contestants were besides Andy Grammer because they unmasked at the same time on the finale. The costume's head was like a bicycle helmet, they kept it on very tight and it weighed a lot. During one of the performances, she was coming out of a box and it was really hard to get her to come out of it because the head was so top heavy. She didn't think she was going to win the season, she thought Boogey Woogey had it. He played his character part so well to her and he had the charisma, he was also very friendly always high-fiving her character Pearl in the hallways.

Despite not thinking she would win, Wilson was determined to do her best to win it all. They had asked her several times to do the show, but it didn't make sense for her to do it. A few years ago, she got COVID and it really threw her for a loop. She's a long hauler from COVID and had fallen playing with a 6-year-old, which gave her a massive leg injury. She was in a wheelchair for 8 months and during that time she gained a lot of weight leaving her with a long road to recovery that included depression. It took her a lot of prayer, determination, and believing in herself to get her to where she is today. She felt like if she could go and do The Masked Singer with how much it was going to take out of her, then she could continue on performing and being an artist. The show really gave her the push she needed to continue her career. At moments, the costume was uncomfortable with her leg injury, so it made some of the rehearsing difficult since he couldn't take her helmet off. By the end of the filming, Wilson went immediately to sleep, get hydrated and do everything to get her body to stop cramping. During filming, she had to have medics give her two IVs because of dehydration so she wanted to get better quickly.

Wilson didn't really have a hometown, she lived everywhere and had a weird childhood so when it came to telling her story for her career, she picked Pocahontas, Iowa. Some of her favorite memories were in this particular city and at two different points in her life, she lived there. While there, she was part of 3 different bands and really made a name for herself in the town. That's when she decided to move to Nashville to become the next Loretta Lynn. Things didn't take off right away, Wilson became a bartender at Bourbon Street Blues and Boogie Bar where she would open at 3 p.m. and close at 3 a.m. She eventually started covering Aretha Franklin and other notable voices with the Blues Band because they wouldn't play country music in the bar. One night, John Rich and Big Kenny walked into the bar as she was working and they had also just met each other. It was through that first meeting that Wilson was invited to join the Music Mafia crew and they became her musical family. That group was good enough to hold an audience and that was all that mattered at the time.

"Redneck Woman" was one of Wilson's massive career moments and to her, she admitted that it takes the right time, voice, and person to make a song a monster hit. For this song, it was the perfect time because women like her weren't being sang about or women in music didn't look like her. Rich and her wrote the song and thought no one was going to play it, but she felt great about a song that was finally written about herself. Fans were blowing up the phones lines of radio stations requesting the song, and Wilson admitted if it weren't for the fans she doesn't think the song would have been that big. Many of the program directors told her they were trying to get the word "redneck" out of people's mouths so her song wouldn't help with that which meant she had to redefine what redneck actually meant.

Beyond Big & Rich, Wilson has worked with several other big names in country music. Just recently, she was on stage at the ACMs to announce all of the Female Vocalist of the Year nominees along with Wynonna Judd, Martina McBride, Sara Evans, and Crystal Gayle. Wilson had a special relationship with McBride over the years. One time Wilson was undergoing surgery and the last thing she saw on TV was McBride on a talk show, so when Wilson came out of surgery she was screaming at the medical professionals "Don't mess with my Martina!" She was able to share that story with her one day which made McBride laugh. McBride also gave Wilson some important advice when she was having issues with a TV show trying to film her daughter. When it comes to advice for new artists today, Wilson says not to expect anything. There is no record deal that is the same, everyone's will be different. She admits that the world today and how artists market themselves is much different, but they should try to stay true to themselves while recognizing they will have to make some concessions along the way. She would tell her younger self to be less nitpicky and demanding, and to be more open-minded. On her first record, Wilson didn't want three of the songs on it, but her label pushed back and won. Now she looks back on that record and is so happy those songs are there.

This year Wilson is touring and having a lot of fun with a new, younger band that has a lot of energy. She's also re-recording Here For The Party with a bunch of new artists. Wilson will also be appearing on a new talent competition show coming out this fall created by Taylor Sheridan. The concept behind the show is artists performing to live audiences in bars and she is to prepare the kids for life on the road.

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