My piece on Tyler Childers message and song on Black Lives Matter was posted at WMOT.org on Monday. Link through for the full thing.
Country songwriter Tyler Childers is selective about speaking for the public record, and when he does, he lands his punches, leaving people astonished and stirred up. He’s probably never sparked so much intrigue as he did over the weekend by releasing a surprise album, a powerful protest song and a video message aimed at his “white rural listeners” expressing solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement.
The album, Long Violent History, would have been its own radical gesture even without its final song. Having released two of the most acclaimed lyrical tour de force albums of recent years - Purgatory in 2017 and Country Squire in 2019 - the Paintsville, KY native put his recent efforts on the fiddle to the test, tracking eight old-time tunes with the relaxed atmosphere of a bonfire picking circle. Then rather suddenly, the title track evokes our national strife, asserts his own need to be heard at this time and poses a scenario in which power roles, and episodes of abuse, were reversed.