Terri Clark tries on Gypsy Boots

"It was this fun song I'd written that was kind of like my life," Clark said. "I started doing it in the shows acoustic - because it says a lot about who I am, where I come from... and the fans just went wild for it. So, wild that we decided to work it up with the band... People were coming up to the merch table asking when or how they could get it. It was completely organic, and also completely me."

"But the other thing about the song is that even though it's specific to me or a traveling musician, it's everybody. Everybody's restless... everybody wants to have that moment when they're completely free and rocking... where they're totally alive, and I think people plugged in pretty hard on that vibe."

With a chorus of "I was born in gypsy boots, guitar on my back/ Rebel soul and attitude, just like Johnny Cash...," the song arrives at secondary radio on July 20 and is available to all stations on CDX and Play MPE.

"Like everything with this record, we're going places we've never been, doing things ways we've never done them. This feels like taking the music straight to the people living it," Clark said. "I'm lucky in that my fans are pretty aggressive and I say that in a good way... and they believe in this music. For us, I think they'd rather help us figure this stuff out to have the real stuff, and so we're gonna try some new things, seek some unconventional opportunities and tell the real about where we all are in our lives.

"I've not been able to play 'The Long Way Home' for a lot of people, but the ones I have been blown away, which feels good when you make a decision like this. in Canada where the single dropped last week, it was the second most added single in any format. Any format? I mean, for a little record that could, that's kinda crazy - but that's the way people are responding."

The 12-song CD drops in September on Clark's own label.