WHEN Miley Cyrus sang that “we were right ’til we weren’t, built a home and watched it burn” in last year’s global hit Flowers she was mourning a lost love.
But those barbed lyrics could just as well be about the feud that is rumoured to be tearing her family apart.
The break-up anthem, which was 2023’s best-selling single worldwide, earned the former Disney TV star her first Grammy last month for Best Pop Solo Performance.
On collecting the award, Miley thanked “my mommy, my sister, my love”, but not her dad, country music star Billy Ray Cyrus.
And the fact that it was her half-sister Brandi who had been invited to the ceremony along with mum Tish led observers to wonder if her other sister Noah was not the sibling being mentioned.
Now a potential reason for the mighty rift has emerged.
An American magazine claims that Noah, 24, had been seeing actor Dominic Purcell until her mum “stole” him from her.
A whirlwind romance followed, and Tish, 56, and Merseyside-born Dominic, 54, got married last August.
Just two months later Billy Ray, 62, married Australian singer Firerose, who at 34 is just three years older than Miley.
Miley appears to have taken her mum’s side, having acted as maid of honour at her wedding, while avoiding her dad’s.
A source told US Weekly magazine: “The turmoil between Noah and Tish goes far beyond.
“Noah is very distraught over Tish stealing Dominic from her.”
But the origins of the Cyrus family’s fall-out stretch far further back than Tish swapping social media messages with Dominic.
Her marriage to Billy Ray, best known for his 1992 hit Achy Breaky Heart, was fractious from the start.
While Tish was pregnant with Miley in the year that Achy Breaky Heart was a worldwide hit, Billy Ray’s previous partner Kristin Luckey was also expecting his son, Christopher Cody, now 31.
He finally wed Tish in 1993, but she said the marriage was not easy.
They both threatened to divorce each other before finally doing so in 2022.
Billy Ray was the first to have divorce papers drawn up in 2010 but held back, then Tish did the same three years later.
But they stuck together, partly for Miley and her five siblings, who also include brothers Braison, 29, and Trace, 35.
The damn show destroyed my family. I’d take it back in a second
Billy Ray Cyrus
Brandi, 36, and Trace were adopted by Billy Ray, their biological father being Tish’s first husband, drummer Baxter Helson.
There have been parental disagreements about Miley’s career.
It was Tish, as her manager, who pushed for her to get the role of Hannah Montana in the Disney TV series when Miley was 13.
The hit show turned the teenager into a global phenomenon, but after a video emerged of her smoking the psychoactive drug salvia aged 18 in 2010 her dad expressed regrets about exposing his child to the show-business world.
A year after the incident he said: “The damn show destroyed my family. I’d take it back in a second.
“For my family to be here and just everybody be OK, safe and sound and happy and normal would have been fantastic.”
Father and daughter reportedly drifted apart over his concerns about Miley’s increasingly wild behaviour, such as appearing topless in photoshoots.
They reconciled until the pandemic provided the wrecking ball for any sense of harmony.
I could not eat, I could not sleep, I could not stop crying
Tish Cyrus
Rather than getting through lockdown together, Billy Ray stayed in Tennessee while Tish stayed with Miley in California.
Tish told a podcast last month that she would “smoke pot and garden and go skinny dipping in my pool” during Covid and had a “breakdown” when her mum died in August 2020.
After her divorce in April 2022 she and Billy Ray issued a joint statement claiming the split was amicable.
They wrote: “It is after 30 years, five amazing children and a lifetime of memories, we have decided to go our separate ways — not with sadness, but with love in our hearts.”
But in the podcast Tish painted a very different picture. She said: “I could not eat, I could not sleep, I could not stop crying.
“I don’t have my mom, and then I don’t have my husband that has been my husband for 30 years. Like I’m scared.”
Miley was said to have fallen out with her dad about the way he treated Tish, with a source saying they were “not on good terms”.
Three months later Tish decided to make contact with divorced dad of four Dominic, who she admits to having a crush on for a long time.
Dominic, who grew up in Australia and played Lincoln Burrows in US TV drama Prison Break for five years, was also secretly interested in her.
According to Tish they “made out” on their first date and within days told each other: “I love you.”
Dominic proposed in April 2023 and they got married in Malibu four months later.
While Brandi, Trace and Miley all attended, Braison and Noah were not there.
They spent the time at a Walmart store not far away in Los Angeles, with Noah sporting a Billy Ray T-shirt, which hints at where her parental loyalties lay.
Last October there were signs of strain between Miley and her youngest sibling, with Noah commenting on social media site X about “the disrespect in this video”.
The video in question was Miley telling podcast host Joe Rogan that Noah’s record The End Of Everything was “the most depressing EP you’ll ever listen to”.
In October 2023 Billy Ray married Firerose, who he started dating after breaking up with Tish.
They met as work colleagues on the set of Hannah Montana many years ago and released a song together in July 2021.
After getting together, Billy Ray and Firerose released the duet Plans, in which they sang: “There’s nothing else I’d rather do than plan the rest of my life with you.”
Billy Ray regularly posts images of himself with his new wife on his Instagram page filled with love hearts.
Miley did not attend her father’s wedding, suggesting any estrange-ment was not over.
That was reinforced by her acceptance speech at the Grammys in January, when she thanked “everyone that’s standing on this stage right now . . . Tom, Tyler, Michael and Greg . . . our teams, my team, Crush, Columbia, my mommy, my sister, my love, my main gays, because look how good I look . . .
“I don’t think I forgot anyone. But I might have forgotten underwear. Bye.”
It has been reported that Billy Ray sent a message to his daughter, congratulating her on her two Grammy awards, Record Of The Year and Best Pop Solo Performance for Flowers.
A source said he “tried reaching out to Miley many times”.
So far neither Miley nor her dad have commented publicly on the rumours of a fall-out.
Many fans believe Flowers was written about Miley’s split from her husband, Hunger Games actor Liam Hemsworth, in August 2019.
Her love life is now more settled as she has been dating drummer Maxx Morando for more than two years.
If she needs heartbreak material for her next record, her family’s problems may be a far more fruitful source.
