Jo Dee Messina is paying tribute to Ella Langley, with the ‘Heads Carolina, Tails California’ hitmaker underlining how much she admires Langley and cherishes their friendship.

Messina and Langley have become close pals over the past year or so, with the duo linking up at the Ryman in November 2025 to perform Messina's hit single, ‘Lesson in Leavin’.

A few months after that, they appeared together on-stage at CRS 2026 to discuss their friendship, as well as touching on Langley's creative process behind Dandelion.

Then, Messina featured on God's Country Podcast and shared a heartfelt cover of Langley's current Country Radio single, ‘Loving Life Again’, one of the stand-outs from Dandelion.

In a new conversation with 615House on Instagram, Messina reflects on her bond with Langley, “Ella...this is another one that's going to make me cry! I love her so much. I loved her before she was massively famous. She's just so sweet in her heart, and she's just so kind and to have that [Ryman Auditorium] moment with her”.

Messina recals, “She said, ‘Will you come out and sing ‘Lesson in Leavin’ with me, and I was like, ‘Oh, sure!’ My bus was leaving that night, and so I'm like, ‘Sure, I can come out and sing, and then I'm just gonna have to head to the bus right after that’. But even just little bit before that, we started a friendship - and I just spoke to her last week, to check up on her and make sure she's doing okay. I love you, Ella!”

We're still waiting on an official studio collaboration between these two country trailblazers, with Messina and Langley's friendship the latest example in a refreshingly long list of sisterhoods in modern country, with the leading women in the genre making a pointed effort to life one another up, rather than sowing seeds of division.

Particularly in a media landscape that often seeks to pit women against one another, as we've seen with coverage of Langley and Megan Moroney in recent years, it feels more important for today's female country stars to keep showing up for one another.