“When we’re together there’s just some sort of magic,” Ashley Monroe recently told Radio.com of her bandmates Miranda Lambert and Angaleena Presley.

Pistol Annies fans will get to hear more of that magic on May 7 when the trio releases its sophomore album, Annie Up. The follow-up to their No. 1 debut Hell on Heels, the band’s new single “Hush, Hush” was just released to country radio.

“We sat and listened to it at the studio when it was finished and all three of us were bawling hysterically,” Monroe said of Annie Up in a recent Radio.com interview. “It’s very special. I feel like a lot of the songs were gifts given to us. We wrote a lot of it on the road and it’s hard to write on the road. When we’re together, there’s just something that happens. When we write, when we’re on stage, when we’re hanging out – there’s just a buzz.”

Writing relatable tracks is important to the Annies, and Monroe stressed that their tracks touch upon things we all go through.

“It was such a pleasant surprise when the fans responded the way they did and it’s driven the Pistol Annies,” she said. “We’ve been writing so much. We can’t stop writing.”

As for the band’s founding, it was a real kismet moment that allowed her and Miranda to start writing together in the first place.

“Pistol Annies was the most random to us,” Monroe said of the band’s inception. “I think God had a master plan. I never ever thought I’d be in a girl band. Neither did Miranda. Neither did Angaleena. It’s just one of those things that the stars lined up and Miranda and I started writing these songs and they were real.”

Though she enjoys working within the group dynamic, being an Annie has given Monroe the confidence to release her new solo album, Like A Rose.

“Touring with them and seeing the fans sing back songs that were album cuts, it’s so encouraging and it really gave me confidence that it was OK to make a record that is exactly me,” she said. “This year I’ll be an Ashley and an Annie, and I’m excited.”