What's in a Song?

Rich Men North of Richmond

Like most of the country by now, I’ve heard the viral song Rich Men North of Richmond and I’ve been trying to understand the phenomenon of it; it is nothing else.

I’ve watched the reaction videos from people of all walks of life, all races, all religions and they get the same emotion and feel their story being told as much or more than any alt-right person might, so the Rolling Stone’s blustering criticism of it is simply an awkward attempt to divide and drive people of all backgrounds away from the song, the artist, because it has the power to unite under it’s message.

Rolling Stone, like so many other corrupted media outlets can’t be honest about music anymore; it has to work with the cabal, the cartel, to drive a wedge between Americans who are flocking to this simple song about the angst of living, as the song says: “In the New World…with an old soul.”

Joseph Hudak, author of the Rolling Stone piece, while honest about the song and the lyrics, asserted, as aggressively as he could, that this is just a Right-Wing thing. One would expect much more out of a usually insightful rag like Rolling Stone. Perhaps viewing a few of the reaction videos might have helped him form an unbiased opinion and deliver a more thoughtful appraisal. But for someone who produced Lies of Omission about the corrupt and co-opted media, I didn’t expect it.

What Hudak misses, intentionally, is that this song speaks to all Americans, because the system is rigged against all of us, regardless of differences and some of it’s appeal is showing that white folks suffer right along with everyone else.

It’s the government in Washington DC that’s turned on all of America, taxing us out of our budgets, inflating our grocery store intake down to a minimum, frustrating our efforts to get ahead with regulations and green energy initiatives that only demand more taxes while also increasing our per hour cost of electricity. The future is even more depressing. Suicides are up at the same time as excess mortality. When we aren’t killing ourselves, they’re doing it for us with vaxx mandates and wave upon wave of Executive Order assaults on our freedoms and financial liberty.

Oliver Anthony (Chris) simply expresses everything I’ve written for the last decade in a three minute song of frustration, but what does Rolling Stone focus on? The mention of obese people milking welfare and Epstein’s island, hoping that the reader will then vilify Anthony and drive him out of the limelight before people start to recognize the true villains in our lives are not our neighbors, but the Rich Men North of Richmond.

Anthony has so far refused the music industry’s attempt to co-opt his music, turning down an eight million dollar offer and I hope he refrains, because I know that accepting the offer would be akin to giving up the voice that has garnered his success. They will quickly edit out such honest lines about welfare and pedophilia and turn him into the type of artist I haven’t been able to listen to for more than 20 years, because it’s dull, lifeless, emotionless, but with all the right hooks and gimmicks to get one to sing along.

Anthony brings soul and pain when he brings out a song. That’s what made Country music my favorite when it was sung by the likes of Haggard, Cash, either Hank Williams and Waylon. Their songs felt like they’d been there, suffered that, dealt with it in inappropriate ways, perhaps, but lived it, lived life, felt life, they didn’t just go from day to day stumbling along. They provided inspiration or a vent for frustration. Their songs could be guidance in a dark time, because they came from someone who had suffered the same.

If Oliver Anthony recognizes he can make all the money he needs by remaining independent and singing about what matters to him and the rest of us, he will inspire a resurgence of the protest anthem song that beats in the heart of every American right now. There’s so much wrong and so much pain in this nation and the people need to express it, use it to make change, drive the Rich Men North of Richmond out of our lives.

I speak of what I know. While I was never tempted by multiple millions, I was once told that I could make a lot of money writing novels, if I would just stop writing “that artsy crap.” My opinion, then as now, and my advice to Oliver Anthony (Chris) is the same: I will remain poor and write what I want. This very blog is proof of that. But Oliver Anthony doesn’t have to endure poverty for his art anymore, so why wouldn’t he sing what he wants? I hope he does.

Our Red Pill film produced by us at 12 Round Productions LIES OF OMISSION.

If you prefer good novels you’ll want to share, try Rebel and Rogue about a young man, growing up trying to do the right thing (not always successfully). Available in paperback at 12 Round Productions and through Amazon along with my other novels.