Rumor Has It

NPR ranked the record as the #114 greatest album made by a female artist, saying:

In 1990, Reba McEntire was in the midst of a streak of successes — in the recording studio, on stage and on screen, too. She might have been criticized for moving into a more country-pop crossover sound with her previous album, Sweet Sixteen. But in true Reba fashion, she didn’t seem to care. She even took it a step further with Rumor Has It, sounding by turns like a slick ‘80s lounge singer on ‘Now You Tell Me,’ a true country music maven on the defiant anthem ‘Climb That Mountain High,’ and a 1930s traditionalist on ‘You Lie.’ And who can forget ‘Fancy?’ That Bobbie Gentry cover about a teenage girl whose mother sells her to the highest bidder and how she triumphs fifteen years later, might well be the most memorable song Reba McEntire ever recorded. Her chameleon-like ability to take on any character and make it her own is why Rumor Has It stands apart in McEntire’s huge discography. While the songs run on familiar themes — love, loss, infidelity — each one is an ode to moving on, discovering yourself, and figuring out how to live the life you want to live.