‘Rich Men North of Richmond’ singer Oliver Anthony has decried Beyoncé‘s 2024 country album ‘Cowboy Carter’ as “complete trash” in a new video.
Anthony, who went viral last year for his folk song, shared a video titled ‘What I’ve Learned from the Music Industry So Far…’ yesterday (December 5) on YouTube. “I had a lot to get off my chest, and we managed to pack it all into this 15-minute video, lol,” Anthony wrote in its description.
The video sees Anthony railing against the practices of the Nashville music industry, which he described as full of “people who look at you like you’re a fuel source”.
“They want to see how much oil they can get out of you. And when they’re done with you, they just spit you out.” He also described his apprehension towards a “scary” new era of artists emerging “out of the dark” with a viral hit and landing in an industry of people who “build a character out of you that fits what they want.”
“The second you step out of that, you just get so much friction from it,” he ranted, adding that it involved “six to ten months” of him “getting stalled and manipulated” by the industry, as he felt he was “discouraged to say things I wanna say”. Anthony self-released his debut studio album ‘Hymnal Of A Troubled Man’s Mind’ in March this year.
However, his rant takes a turn as he recalled a time when he was asked to “make some stupid post about Beyoncé’s country album” and about “how it was good” even though he felt ‘Cowboy Carter’ was “complete trash”.
He expressed that listening to her cover of [Dolly Parton‘s] ‘Jolene’ made him want to “throw up”, and how it’s “total cringe”.
“It represents how degenerative our society has become that a song like a Beyoncé version of ‘Jolene’ can come out and anybody actually listen to it and think it’s not just complete trash,” he continued. Parton previously shared that she was “happy” Beyoncé covered the song: “As a songwriter, you love the fact that people do your songs no matter how they do them.”
In recent news, Beyoncé was named the greatest pop star of the 21st century by Billboard “based on her full 25 years of influence, impact, evolution”.
Last week, it was reported that a Yale University course dedicated to Beyoncé has been set up for students, named Beyoncé Makes History: Black Radical Tradition History, Culture, Theory & Politics through Music.
Rumours of a 2025 Beyoncé tour have also been shut down by her representatives. However, fans can soon catch her the NFL Christmas-day Halftime Show on December 25 via a livestream on Netflix.
Beyoncé’s ’16 Carriages’ was also awarded as one of NME‘s 50 best songs of 2024. Kristen S. He wrote: “Within the grand Americana of ‘Cowboy Carter’, ‘16 Carriages’ shows us Beyoncé’s beating heart.”
“On this epic gospel-country ballad, she weaves the story of her teenage ambitions, motherhood and the sacrifices she’s made for her career – glancing toward her past, and continuing to rewrite her already-iconic legacy.”
