Artist:Tanner Usrey Hometown: Prosper, Texas Song: “Pick Up Your Phone” Release Date: November 11, 2022
In Their Words: “With its sparse arrangements and little nuances, ‘Pick Up Your Phone’ is my favorite song that I’ve ever recorded. It’s a song about disconnection. Lyrically, it sounds like a letter home. The initial inspiration came as I was driving from Arkansas to Texas after a long night out on the town. I was reflecting on a conversation I’d had with a family friend who felt I had become distant and was questioning why I never called anymore. It got me thinking about the people in my life back home and how communication is a two-way street.” — Tanner Usrey
With a discography as long, deep and wide-ranging as Del McCoury’s, it can be hard to even know where to start. Well, folks, we’re here to help with a “Del 101” primer of the modern era’s ultimate bluegrass star through the decades of his career. By no means does this overview cover everything you should be listening to from his orbit. But here’s where to start if you don’t already know his body of work.
1940s and ’50s
Named after President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Delano Floyd McCoury was born Feb. 1, 1939, in York, Pa. For many years, his birthplace was cited as Bakersville, North Carolina (even his online entry in IBMA’s Hall of Fame says that), but he’s a Pennsylvania native.
One of six kids, Del grew up on a farm. Music entered the picture through the radio airwaves, and what first fired his imagination was hearing Bill Monroe and his Blue Grass Boys. Inspired by Earl Scruggs’ lightning-fast “fancy banjo,” young Del took up the instrument. That was his instrument when he started playing in a series of bluegrass bands after high school, Stevens Brothers and Keith Daniels & the Blue Ridge Ramblers among them, while working day jobs in logging and construction.
After he was drafted into the military and medically discharged, McCoury was working and playing in Baltimore, where one of his frequent picking partners was former Blue Grass Boys bassist Jack Cooke. That connection led to McCoury joining the Blue Grass Boys himself in 1963 – initially as banjo player, but then as lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist when Monroe simultaneously hired Bill Keith. McCoury would spend a year playing with Monroe, during which time he played the Grand Ole Opry for the first time.
By mid-decade, McCoury was back in Pennsylvania, married to his wife Jean and raising a family. The year 1968 brought his first album under his own name, Del McCoury Sings Bluegrass, recorded with a couple of his fellow Monroe alumni and released on Arhoolie Records. The album is more than solid, even if it shows he hadn’t quite found his own voice just yet, but McCoury’s takes on the bluegrass standards “I Wonder Where You Are Tonight” and “Roll in My Sweet Baby’s Arms” are first-rate. The cover shows McCoury with a cocky grin and trademark pompadour already in place.
“He always had the pompadour going back to the late ’60s,” says Del’s daughter Rhonda. “There was always a little bit of pompadour even when he’d grease his hair back, so I guess that’s just the way Dad’s hair has always been. People ask, ‘How does it do that?’ Well, it just does. It’s trained that way!”
1970-79
By the dawn of the 1970s, McCoury had assembled what would be his backup group for the next two decades – Del McCoury & the Dixie Pals, featuring his brother Jerry McCoury on bass. Even though he was still on the day-job grind and had yet to take the plunge into music full-time, he started making in-roads overseas with tours of Canada and Japan. The latter tour yielded a fine in-concert album, 1980’s Live in Japan.
It was also with the Dixie Pals that McCoury made his first truly great album. Released in 1973 on the Rounder Records label, High on a Mountain remains a start-to-finish tour de force. Especially great is the title track, penned by the legendary old-time folkie Ola Belle Reed.
1980-89
This particular decade was all about family coming together, when McCoury’s sons joined his band. Ronnie McCoury was all of 14 years old when he signed on as his dad’s mandolinist in 1981, and younger brother Robbie was just 16 when he became Del’s banjo player in 1987. Both quickly became among the most acclaimed virtuoso players in bluegrass.
Following a very fine album with his brother Jerry, 1987’s The McCoury Brothers, Del made one last solo album — 1988’s Don’t Stop the Music, the place to start with for this era of Del. He’s never sounded more forlorn than on this album’s “Knee Deep in the Blues.” But on a more positive note, by the end of the ’80s, the Dixie Pals had rebranded as Del McCoury Band as they went roaring into the ’90s.
1990-99
The ’90s were when Del McCoury Band ascended to the top rank of bluegrass acts, especially after their relocation to Nashville. McCoury and band started winning IBMA Awards in bushels, eventually amassing 31 starting with 1990’s Male Vocalist of the Year (an award he’s won four times). It’s hard to go wrong with pretty much any 1990s-vintage McCoury album, especially 1992’s Blue Side of Town – featuring the Steve Earle-penned “If You Need a Fool,” a song Phish has been known to cover. Just as strong is the 1993 follow-up A Deeper Shade of Blue, featuring a stellar take on the Jerry Lee Lewis standard “What Made Milwaukee Famous.” It earned the first of McCoury’s 14 Grammy nominations.
Also Grammy-nominated was The Mountain, a 1999 collaboration with Earle, who wrote in the album’s liner notes that he “wanted to write just one song that would be performed by at least one band at every bluegrass festival in the world long after I have followed Mr. Bill (Monroe) out of this world.” The title track might be it.
2000-09
For long stretches, Del McCoury Band had IBMA’s prestigious Entertainer of the Year award locked down, winning it every year from 1998 through 2002 and nine times overall. McCoury also joined the Grand Ole Opry as a member in 2003 and won his first of two Grammys with 2005’s The Company We Keep. Ever modest, McCoury kicked that album off with “Nothin’ Special.”
At the end of the decade, McCoury’s backup band also began performing on their own without Del as the Travelin’ McCourys, and the long-running annual get-together DelFest began. (The 15th annual DelFest will happen May 25-28, 2023, in Cumberland, Maryland.) Having played bluegrass festivals all his life, Del had some thoughts about making his the best it could be.
“When we started talking about doing a festival, he looked back at how many different places he’d played that just didn’t do it right,” says his daughter Rhonda. “Like places that didn’t seem to care about artists having to go through a mud pit to get to a stage, and he’s always dressed for a show. He feels like if he can take care of things, everyone else should too.”
2010-present
In recent decades, honors for McCoury have continued with a 2010 NEA National Heritage Fellowship, a 2011 induction into the IBMA Hall of Fame and another Grammy Award, for 2013’s nostalgic The Streets of Baltimore. The Del McCoury Band’s newest album, Almost Proud, will compete for Best Bluegrass Album in February 2023. That’s indicative of the esteem McCoury’s peers hold him in. He and his band have collaborated on-record and onstage with a long list of artists, from “Dawg music” mandolinist David Grisman to New Orleans’ Preservation Hall Jazz Band on 2011’s American Legacies.
Another unlikely yet brilliant collaboration involved the anthemic U2 song “Pride (In the Name of Love),” which Dierks Bentley covered on his 2010 album Up on the Ridge. At the suggestion of producer Jon Randall, Bentley enlisted McCoury to sing the high part on the chorus.
“That part’s so high and the only person who can sing that high lonesome note is Del,” says Bentley. “We were working on that note, getting up there, and I called Ronnie. ‘Work him hard,’ he said, ‘he’ll get it! He’s stronger the longer he goes.’ That’s opposite of most people, but it’s true for him. Sure enough, he just got better and better. Once he found it, there was so much power. When he came onstage unannounced at Telluride in 2019 and did that one with me, it was about the biggest highlight of my life.”
Artist:Grizzly Goat Hometown: Raleigh, North Carolina Song: “Raleigh, NC” Release Date: December 14, 2022
In Their Words: “On the eve of moving to Raleigh, North Carolina, I received some terrible news about the future of this band, Grizzly Goat. It was the type of blow that nearly ended the band right then and there, a real gut punch. The next morning in a fog of disappointment and heartbreak, I wrote this strangely upbeat song. Who knows why it came out that way. Fortunately, the band overcame and out of this harrowing close call, we had our next single! Grizzly Goat has been together in some form since 2013, when we were in our early 20s. We’ve all had so many path altering experiences over the last decade; college, marriages, birth and loss, cross-country moves. Our unwavering passion for creating music together hasn’t come without its challenges and sometimes navigating the turbulence is fatiguing. Though this song has an upbeat vibe, I wrote it in response to feeling that weight.” — Nate Waggoner, Grizzly Goat
Artist:Joss Stone Hometown: Dover, Kent, England; currently Nashville, Tennessee Song: “What Christmas Means to Me” Album:Merry Christmas, Love Label: S-Curve/Hollywood Records
In Their Words: “I loved recording this album, especially this song as it really brought the Christmas spirit and turned it up. It really puts a smile on my face and makes me think of all the unique things that make Christmas special to me. Great lyrics by the legend that is Stevie Wonder. What a fun song to have amongst the wonder and magic of this album. The video was great fun, more so because my baby girl and boy were right there with me. What a delight! And how festive. Can’t believe how lucky I am at this time in my life.
“I have thought about making a Christmas album for years, I am Christmas obsessed! Making this record has honestly been a dream come true. It’s been years and years playing in my head and now finally I get to hear it in reality. It seems to be very true that good things come to those who wait. All the Christmas stars have aligned and put me in the right place at the right time with the right team of people to make this music shine magic in every direction. I just hope people enjoy hearing it as much as I have making it.” — Joss Stone
For the past eight or so years I’ve been making this joke that we (the music industry) should “Give women Americana.” As in, if we gave the entire genre — and bluegrass and country and old-time and folk, for that matter — to women and femmes and non-men, I wouldn’t so much miss the men and the music would certainly be well cared for and well set up for the future.
My point, as I continue to make this joke year after year to many puzzled reactions, is that women and femme roots musicians have and will always be my favorite artists, creators, songwriters, and pickers. As I crafted my debut solo album, 1992 – often with incredibly talented women like producers and engineers (and pickers) Cathy Fink & Marcy Marxer, mastering engineer Anna Frick, photographer Laura E. Partain – the music that inspired, informed, and challenged me most through this release was all made by women. (Ask me sometime about my monthly Spotify playlist, Don’t Need No Man.) When BGS approached me to make a Mixtape to celebrate 1992, I knew I had to share some of the women who helped me realize, musically, artistically, socially, emotionally, that there could be a home for me in bluegrass, largely because they had created such a home exactly for me. Here are a few of my bluegrass, old-time, and country inspirations, all of whom have filtered into this album in one way or another. – Justin Hiltner
Ola Belle Reed – “High On the Mountain”
1992 was tracked in Ashe County, North Carolina, in a little town called Lansing nestled into the Blue Ridge Mountains, right where Tennessee, Virginia, and North Carolina meet. I love it out there on the mountain, in the wind, in the clouds, on the rocky little road cuts and switchbacks through the hills. Lansing also happens to be the hometown of a legendary Appalachian musician and bluegrass forebear, Ola Belle Reed. A banjo she once owned and had signed hung on the wall beside me while I tracked every song. I definitely see my album as stemming from the lineage of Ola Belle, humbly and gratefully. Cathy Fink & Marcy Marxer – “Hold Each Other Up”
I’ve been so lucky to collaborate with folk icons, Grammy winners, and children’s music legends Cathy & Marcy in so many different contexts and scenarios, every single one delightful and fulfilling. They’re amazing mentors and encouragers and while we recorded 1992 we had to take the chance to channel their amazing attitudes and worldviews into a COVID-inspired (or -instigated) track, “Hold Each Other Up.” I love getting to pick and sing with these two, and their engineering, production, wisdom, and guidance all made this record possible.
Laurie Lewis – “I’m Gonna Be the Wind”
Long before I ever got the chance to tour and perform with Laurie Lewis she was a hero of mine, someone I looked up to and knew would be a bluegrass legend and stalwart who could or would accept me for who I am. Turns out, often in bluegrass, it is okay to meet your heroes, because when we met and I got to work for her, it turned out I was absolutely right. Her writing style, her artistic ethos, and the way she infuses pure bluegrass energy and her personality into everything she does reminds me I can be who I am, play the music I play, and write the way I write. This song picks me up whenever I’m down and gives me self-confidence and optimism when I need it most.
Alice Gerrard & Hazel Dickens – “Mama’s Gonna Stay”
I never had the honor of meeting Hazel before she passed in 2011, but Alice Gerrard and I have become friends over the past six years and honestly, if 17-year-old Justin knew he’d become friends with this Bluegrass Hall of Famer, he’d die. We happen to share a birthday, too. Alice is a gem, a trailblazer, an unassuming and unrelenting activist and organizer and community builder. She inspires me in all of the above, but especially in her willingness, across her entire career, to write music about things no one else was writing about. This song, which Laurie Lewis turned me onto (she performs it as well), is a perfect example.
Playing shows and recording totally solo is often terrifying. Especially as a bluegrass banjo player used to playing in five-piece lineups. It took many years and lots and lots of practice time and experimental shows to figure out how exactly I wanted to arrange songs, build shows, create and ride a storytelling arc during my shows, guide an audience, and do all of that confidently with just a voice and banjo. Artists and pickers like Elizabeth Cotten gave me frames of reference for what I was doing that felt solidly bluegrass, but still building a show and sound that feels fully realized and not lacking for being minimal.
Missy Raines – “Where You Found Me”
Missy Raines is another hero of mine that I feel so lucky to now call a friend. Despite coming from different generations and very different circumstances we have so much in common. It just sometimes astounds me that we can have seemingly endless conversations around if bluegrass (or country or roots music) are accepting and open; meanwhile one of the winningest pickers in the history of bluegrass and the IBMA – that is, Missy Raines – has always been both accepting and open. Who needs the sexist, homophobic, womanizing, problematic elements of bluegrass when you have absolute badass legends like Missy!? I once covered this song for a “Cover Your Friends” show and it continues to devastate me to this day.
Caroline Spence – “Scale These Walls”
When I first moved to town, Caroline Spence was one of maybe four or five people I knew in all of Nashville. We spent a lot of time together in those early years, back in 2011 and 2012, and pretty soon after that we wrote a song together, “Pieces.” We both loved it a lot, performed it here and there with different lineups and bands, but it never landed on a record ‘til now. “Scale These Walls,” from Caroline’s most recent album, is constantly stuck in my head. I love how it showcases her jaw-dropping skill for writing dead-on hooks that feel so organic and never corny. I love this song.
Molly Tuttle – “Crooked Tree”
Molly Tuttle and I wrote “Benson Street,” a track off my new album, together about five or six years ago. It’s a cute little number about longing told through the lens of an idyllic Southern summer. I love every chance I get to make music or write music with Molly. She’s a constant source of inspiration for me and proof positive that you can be a proverbial crooked tree in bluegrass and still carve a pathway to success. Plus, she’s another great example of a picker who can command an entire audience totally solo. Trying to steal tricks from Molly Tuttle? Couldn’t be me.
Rhiannon Giddens – “Following the North Star”
Rhiannon Giddens is the blueprint. When I think about my artistic future and the way I want to be able to glide between media, between contexts, between areas of expertise and subject matter, between pop and roots and so many other musical communities, I think of Rhiannon. The way she has built her career around her artistic and political perspective, so that no matter what she does it feels grounded in her personality and selfhood is exactly how I want to be as an artist and creator. Plus, I always want to be as big of a music nerd and as big of an old-time nerd as her.
Maya de Vitry – “How Bad I Wanna Live”
Maya is one of those writers and musicians who just makes me feel seen and heard and understood, and I know I’m only one in a huge host of people who would say the same. The vulnerability and transparency in her writing and the emotional and spiritual availability within it are astounding. Plus, she’s almost always, constantly challenging herself to consider the ways she creates and makes music outside of consumerism and art as a commodity. I moved to Nashville to be challenged, musically and artistically, by those around me and I feel so lucky to have Maya around me and a member of my community.
Courtney Hartman – “Moontalk”
Courtney Hartman’s “Moontalk” makes me feel like every single song I’ve ever written about the moon is good and right and allowable. (We both have quite a few songs about the moon, actually.) “Moontalk” feels like Mary Oliver incarnate in bluegrass-informed picking and singing. It feels meditative and contemplative, but not timid or insular – something I’m always trying to accomplish in solo contexts. I’m constantly inspired by Courtney and the way she centers community building in her music and life. She’s another one who, though she thrives performing and making music solo, you know that music came from a multitude of folks pouring through her.
Dale Ann Bradley – “He’s the Last Thing On My Mind”
I thank a few artists who have inspired and influenced me in a huge way in 1992’s liner notes and Dale Ann Bradley is one of them. I feel like I am constantly ripping off and (poorly) mimicking her vocal runs, phrasing, licks, and delivery. I think she might have the best bluegrass voice of all time, or at least it’s very very high up on the list. When I first moved to town I worked as an intern at Compass Records and just getting to be a small part of the team that worked a handful of her records meant so much to me.
Lee Ann Womack – “Last Call”
Lee Ann Womack is another who I thank in the album’s liner notes, another who I emulate vocally as much as I can get away with. I used to wear out this track and this album, Call Me Crazy, listening on repeat over and over. When I found out this song was co-written by an openly gay songwriter, it rocked my world. I already heard so much queerness in LAW’s catalog, and this confirmation came at a time when I needed to feel like I was given permission to exist in bluegrass, country, and Nashville. I know now that no one needs that permission, but it was critical then.
Linda Ronstadt – “Adios”
During the 1992 recording session I recorded a solo banjo rendition of this song, one I’ve been performing for years at shows. It means so much to me and Linda’s performance is stunning in its power and tenderness, a combination I’m often striving for. I hope to release it some time soon as a single, then again on a deluxe vinyl edition of 1992. It will not be the last time I pay tribute to Linda and her incredible career and catalog – plus, she is a huge bluegrass fan! It just makes sense to me.
Dolly Parton, Emmylou Harris, Linda Ronstadt – “Wildflowers”
When I had the pleasure of being a guest on the hit podcast Dolly Parton’s America, I sang this song and “Silver Dagger” among a few other from Dolly’s catalog that I felt had queer under/overtones. The response to my on-air picking was enormous, and there were immediate demands to release my versions of the songs. Cathy, Marcy and I recorded “Wildflowers” together during the 1992 sessions and it’s one of my favorite tracks that resulted from that week on the mountain. It’s gotten quite a lot of play, which I’m so grateful for, and always gives me an opportunity to talk about Trio and Dolly and how the story in “Wildflowers” parallels many a queer journey. It’s the perfect track to round out this Mixtape and I thank you for reading and listening along.
With a welcoming smile and an incredibly expressive tenor voice, Del McCoury has enchanted audiences since the 1960s. He’s that rare entertainer who’s both confident and humble, giving him the ability to fit in anywhere from bluegrass festivals to Bonnaroo. Every time we’ve been able to spend time with Del over the years, it’s been a privilege. In a small gesture of gratitude, we celebrate his artistic endeavors this week in a series we’re calling Del in December.
In the days ahead, look for a decade-by-decade recap of McCoury’s exceptional life and career written by North Carolina journalist David Menconi. We’ll also share one of our favorite interviews with Del about his album, Almost Proud, which just received a Grammy nomination. In addition, there’s an exclusive holiday video coming up, as well as a testimonial from Del’s inner circle who tell us what he’s really like as a boss, a father, and a friend. (No surprise: He’s a great guy!)
We’ve been fortunate to share many of Del McCoury’s most recent collaborations on BGS, including his recordings with Vince Gill, Junior Sisk, and Billy Strings. We even got an invitation to his 80th birthday party at the Grand Ole Opry. Perhaps our favorite moment, though, is this special video from The Bluegrass Situation archives of McCoury teaming up with fellow bluegrass legend Sam Bush. Stick around ’til the end and check out Del’s banjo pickin’ skills, too!
Artist:Taylor Ashton Hometown: Vancouver, B.C.; Brooklyn, New York Song: “Santa’s Song (I Don’t Believe in Myself)” Label: Signature Sounds
In Their Words: “Could Santa Claus suffer from imposter syndrome? If so, I can definitely relate. Carving out a music career in this day and age definitely requires a little suspension of disbelief. It’s not always easy to believe in your own gifts, or to believe that you have something to offer. But it can be healing to hear that somebody else is also struggling. And so, I offer this little melancholy holiday ballad with a sense of humor and a little nod to the geography of Canada, my home country.” — Taylor Ashton
Artist:Mile Twelve Hometown: Boston, Massachusetts Song: “Johnny Oklahoma” Album:Close Enough to Hear Release Date: February 3, 2023
In Their Words: “This song combines so many raw materials that have been rattling around in my head for years. Shirley Jackson’s short story ‘The Lottery’ about the ritual stoning of an innocent person chosen at random, in order to keep the rest of the town safe. Lawnchair Larry who flew attached only to helium balloons. Casey at the Bat who seemed so mythic and invincible until he struck out. And finally the Irish folk song ‘Mrs. McGrath,’ in which a mother mourns the loss of her son’s legs in a battle overseas. Johnny Oklahoma is in the prime of his life when he decides to sacrifice everything for his community by being blasted out of a cannon and straight into kingdom come.” — Evan Murphy, Mile Twelve
Artist:Tone Dog Hometown: Durango, Colorado Song: “Lonesome Bicycle Farmer” Release Date: December 9, 2022
In Their Words: “I wrote this tune as a flatpicking ode to John Coltrane’s classic quartet of the early to mid ’60s (Coltrane, McCoy Tyner, Elvin Jones, Jimmy Garrison). So much of the bluegrass tradition is steeped in the idea of getting at the ‘roots’ of the sound, the ancient tones and the original innovators. With the continual rising wave of jamgrass I thought it would be really cool to honor what I consider to be the ‘roots’ of the jam tradition, mid-’60s free jazz. As a drummerless improvising trio, it takes a lot of trust in one another to be able to keep the train moving — we have to believe in the shared vision of where the tune is going and commit to its unexpected twists and turns. I think that spirit comes through the recording and stays true to the spontaneous and creative ethic that both bluegrass and jazz uphold.” — Alex Graf, Tone Dog
Adeem the Artist is not afraid to confront the complex realities that some country songwriters would find more convenient to gloss over. A nonbinary musician who lives in Knoxville, Tennessee, with their wife and young child, Adeem is nothing if not honest. Throughout their new album, White Trash Revelry, they have written songs that feel so deeply personal, yet relatable, exposing pain and struggle in nuanced ways that can make a listener reflect in one moment and laugh in the next.
If you won’t take our word for it, perhaps Brandi Carlile’s will hold more weight: “Adeem the Artist is absolutely incredible. One of the best writers in roots music that I’ve ever heard,” she noted on her SiriusXM radio show, Somewhere Over the Radio. On the last night of a tour supporting William Elliot Whitmore at Off Broadway in St. Louis, Adeem captivated the audience, weaving stories and playful banter between original songs. BGS caught up with them before the performance, and they were generously on-brand with their openness and honesty.
BGS: I read the essay you wrote in the liner notes. From that, and listening to the album, I was struck by the range of emotions with which you reflect on childhood. Can you tell me a little bit about the process of writing these songs and reconciling those mixed emotions?
Adeem: The suffering and celebration thing is important to me. There’s a (Kahlil) Gibran line where he says, ‘the deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you’re capable of holding.’ That’s something that I’m connected with on this record. They’re not two different things. They’re intrinsically bound.
I mean, this was a frustrating thing for my parents when I was a teenager and a young adult. I was still very plugged into the Christian Church, really passionate about Jesus, and about, you know, building the kingdom of God, and telling ’em they were hypocrites for having a large television and living in a big house and saying like, “You have to give away your money. If you wanna do this, this is what it looks like.” That’s the Christianity that I grew up with. It had a lot of toxic impacts on me, but it is also the reason why I’m who I am. It’s the reason why I care about justice. It’s the reason why I care about equity. It’s the reason why I care about racial equity in country music. The biggest thing for me is to really try to be honest about the experience that I had growing up as a low-income white kid in the rural south.
Tell me a little bit about your songwriting process.
My songwriting process is not exactly rote. I have extensive rules for songwriting, but most of them are kind of unspoken and latent and implicit. I do find the idea that you have to write every day to be a bit obtuse. I think it misses the mark of how much of the experience of writing is sort of adding to your palette. I feel like I’m always working on songs. I just gestate a lot. Louis Hyde talks about the parable of the shoemaker and how you can work and work and work and toil and toil and toil, but sometimes the lightning strikes at night and you wake up and it’s there, it’s done. Your unconscious kind of fulfills the duty of the imagination. I think that’s true. I think about moments that we don’t want to talk about, that we don’t want to address, that we would rather paint over.
I was thinking about the idea of trying to reconcile things as an adult that you learned from your loved ones.
Yeah. I mean, I love Thanksgiving. I like cooking a lot and I like cooking for my friends and the people that I consider family. It’s special to me, and I’ve always loved the Thanksgiving story. You know, my ancestors came over on this big, beautiful boat, and they got here and there were these amazing, interesting indigenous people, and they shared their food with them, and they shared their food back, and then some of them even fell in love and they had this big dinner. It’s beautiful. I think anyone would think it’s beautiful, but it’s just not true. It never happened. The reality is we tried to exterminate them. My ancestors came here and did everything they could to make sure there was no trace of them on the earth, and they survived. Now that’s a special story, but it doesn’t frame my ancestors in the best light.
And I think that what’s important to me is that I figured out that it doesn’t do anyone any good because it assuages us of the responsibility to make things right. That’s the same thing that’s happening with a lot of areas in country music where people are able to rewrite these sort of Thanksgiving stories. What I found was that I would rather tell a story that is still beautiful, that’s still wholesome, that’s not trying to demonize anybody, but is trying to welcome a sort of healing to try and fix the broken pieces. A lot of country musicians make the choice to tell a lie because they think it’s making things better in some way, and it’s a lie and it’s hurting people in very real ways. I don’t think that telling the truth means I have to sacrifice any compassion or kindness or love for my community or my culture, or my family, my ancestors, my people, nothing. It’s just holding it all.
I want to ask about a song from your last record, Cast Iron Pansexual, in which you address Toby Keith with references to three of his songs, by my count. From “I Wish You Would’ve Been a Cowboy,” it sounds like you were at least somewhat of a fan of Toby Keith. Talk about what it was like to grow up singing along to those songs and then having a sort of epiphany about the lyrics as you got older.
Sure. I mean, for one, I don’t know that I stopped regarding Toby Keith as an excellent songwriter. It’s tough for me to answer that because I went through a really significant change. I grew up in Charlotte. My family’s from the lower Piedmont region, just outside of the city. When I was 12 or 13 years old, we moved to Syracuse, New York. I had been listening to country music but also growing apart from it pretty naturally. I was what some might call “fagish.” I was a bit effeminate. My mom smoked weed and went to metal shows. I got in trouble for swearing in class one time. I didn’t fit in the rural town where I was.
Just all that to say, I felt estranged from it probably before I started interfacing with any of the heaviness of why I was feeling estranged. When I moved to New York it was like, you know, it doesn’t matter what you wear when your accent’s like, (says in a thick southern accent) “Oh, me mama gonna go get the buggy from the grocery.” You know? It’s like I was a good old boy all of a sudden. I was a redneck, which is a really weird thing to interface with. So, country music was something that I shied away from and didn’t think about for a long time.
But as those years went on, [the experiences in New York] became further and further from me. You know, I think about it now, and it’s like, man, I was listening to Garth Brooks sing about how being gay is okay in the ‘90s. Holy shit. You know what I mean? The country music industry became so richly conservative in ways that it wasn’t before, even in the aftermath of 9/11 and with what they did to Natalie Maines, you know? Talk about cancel culture…
Luckily there are many artists out there who have bucked the trend, but there’s certainly a lot of country music that perpetuates misogyny, American exceptionalism, and exalt “the South” in such a way…ideas that you decry in your songs. You touched on it already, but can you talk more about your relationship with country music in general?
There are two things I want to say. The first is a merging of this question, and the last one you asked me, which is, I do want to say I really toiled over whether or not I wanted to release this song (“I Wish You Would’ve Been a Cowboy”). I have jokingly said in the past that it’s because I didn’t want Willie Nelson to be disappointed in me. But the truth is, I don’t know Toby Keith. I don’t know what he’s about. I don’t know how he feels about this. I don’t know if he’s ever thought about it. But most people, when they’re told, “Hey, something you did hurt people,” they’re like, “Well, fuck, I didn’t mean to do that.” I would imagine that he would probably have the same reaction. So, I really hope to have that sort of interaction. I’m not a cancel culture person. I really would like to see people healed in some meaningful way.
My relationship with country music has been estranged until about, I’d say, six or seven years ago. I discovered Roger Alan Wade. He wrote the Jackass theme song, “If You’re Gonna Be Dumb, You Gotta Be Tough,” and “Butt Ugly Slut,” and some other disgusting songs. But he’s written some really stunning poetry. He’s got this song where he describes the West Texas sunset as “spread out like rusted chrome.” It’s really gorgeous. He has such a poetic lens and such a compassionate view at fundamentally broken and lost characters that drew me in. The Mountain Goats are one of my favorite bands, and he seemed to be writing about some of the same riffraff that would cycle a Mountain Goats album.
And through him I got into Guy Clark and John Prine and James McMurtry. John Prine was, in many ways, like coming home. I’d always been really into the marriage of suffering and celebration. That was always kind of like my bag. I think I’m better at it now than I used to be. My mark has been a sort of conglomerate of intense emotional pain interspersed with moments of just chaotic jack-assery and laughter, you know? When I first heard John Prine, it was like a true north. I heard him and I was like, “Oh, he is following something that I’m following. And he’s closer to it.” I felt such a natural kinship with him. And I felt that with a lot of other country musicians too.
On White Trash Revelry, it seemed like you embraced more of a pop-country sound, whereas the prior album felt a lot more folky and subdued. Did that happen organically or was that something you were trying to accomplish in the writing and recording process?
Yeah. I was trying to write some songs. There was a period where I was really into the idea that I might get a publishing deal someday, and I love my family a lot. The idea that I could be able to afford to give my family a good life and not have to be on the road or whatever was like, “Yeah, I would like to do that.” So, I wrote “Baptized in Well Spirits” and “Middle of a Heart.” There are probably four songs on this record that were written pretty strongly…like they were crafted, you know? The intention, when I wrote them, I wanted somebody else to sing them. But then, as this album started taking shape, it became clear they really fit in. So, I don’t know if that’s the direction that I will persist in moving forward or not, you know, incorporating the pop country elements of it. But I like having it on my palette, and I’m not gonna take it off. If it feels right, I’ll keep doing it.
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