Country artist Katie Rigby continues the anticipation of her upcoming EP with the release of another stellar single, ‘Johnny You’re Ugly’.
Hot off the back of her first headline show at Deaf Institute, Manchester, Rigby brings fans the third instalment of her 2026 releases. With huge success already from ‘Whiskey Rebound’ and ‘Too Good To Last’, ‘Johnny You’re Ugly’ is the next taste of her upcoming EP, set for release later this year.
Co-written with friend, band-mate and multi-instrumentalist Rhys Jiang, ‘Johnny You’re Ugly’ is Rigby at her finest. With her quick wit and tongue-in-cheek lyrics, Rigby delivers a fun, toe-tapper that has already been a hit at her live performances.
“This song channels the spirit of Conway Twitty and Loretta Lynn’s ‘You’re the Reason Our Kids Are Ugly’ – that funny, savage, completely unapologetic energy. I low-key believe my horoscope over fact any day, and dating can be genuinely hard. Men can be walking red flags and when you’ve got your love goggles on, you just don’t see them. This song is about finally taking them off.”
The Johnny in question? Johnny Bravo. After a New Year’s Eve spent watching YouTube with Jiang, the pair were curious about his horoscope. Rigby already had a melody in mind and wanted to merge this with Jiang’s inimitable banjo skills, remembering a technique her grandad had taught her as a child: how to enter a chord with a walking riff. And with that, the song was born.
Katie has had a full year so far, playing Country To Country (C2C) in London, along with Buckle and Boots Festival and of course, her first headline show at Deaf Institute, Manchester. She’s also played Song Suffragettes in London alongside a busy schedule of support slots.|