The Daily Telegraph - Saturday
Country purists, swallow your bile – this is a broadside against tradition
Music
Beyoncé
Cowboy Carter
(Parkwood Entertainment)
★★★★★
ADVANCE publicity has proposed that RnB superstar Beyoncé’s eighth solo offering, Cowboy Carter, would be her country album, suggesting a rather timeworn and cynical showbiz tradition of paying respect to established genres to conquer different demographics. Indeed, the sight of the most famous black American woman in contemporary culture donning a Stetson for global chart-topping single Texas Hold ‘Em these past weeks has been widely treated as a signifier of a worldwide pop shift towards this most conservative, white and all-American of roots musical formats.
Anyone looking forward to pedalsteel narratives of careworn domestic wisdom, campfire singalongs, square dance hoedowns, or the ubiquitous Disneyfied pop gloss of Nashville’s check shirt music factory should get their ear plugs out now. More broadminded listeners will be applauding with delight. From the bravura confrontational blast of opening epic American Requiem (that resembles Buffalo Springfield’s For
What It’s Worth reshaped into a gospel choral electronic prog rock opus) it is clear that Beyoncé has come not to pay homage to country music but to transform it.
“They said I wasn’t country enough,” the Texan pop diva snaps, apparently still rankled by the coldshoulder treatment she received performing her country influenced song
Daddy Lessons with the Dixie Chicks at the Country Music Association Awards in 2016. “Now’s the time to face the wind,” Beyoncé insists in a voice so replete with subtle micro notes and fluttery vocal shifts that even a threat sounds like seduction. What follows is 80 minutes and 27 tracks of dazzling,
‘Her country home exists in a whole different dimension to anything that claimed this heritage before’
genre-defying songcraft, a twisted and magnificent psychedelic shapeshifting folk-rock hip-hop broadside against the conservatism of the country genre. Her married surname may be Carter, but Beyoncé Knowles picked it up when she wed rap superstar Jay Z, not because she became an honourary member of the original country Carter family, and it is clear where her allegiances lie.
With the croaky spoken voice of Willie Nelson offering sneaky verbal interjections in the guise of a stoned late night radio host and the endorsement of Dolly Parton (“Hey miss Honey B, it’s Dolly P”), Beyoncé has some big guns on her side, but she is certainly not overawed. Who else would be bold enough to completely rewrite Parton’s classic Jolene to give the narrative the voice of a modern woman not “begging” but “warning” the interloper not to come for her man? “I know I’m a queen, Jolene,” she sings over acoustic picking and a thumping beat. “There’s a thousand girls in every room / That act as desperate as you do.”
I can imagine the outrage of country purists as Beyoncé deigns to add a new bridge and second chorus section to this classic, but anyone taking issue might want to pay attention to the sinister murder ballad Daughter that follows fast on its heels: “Your body laid out on these filthy floors / Your bloodstains on my custom couture,” she gently sings, before unleashing a blast of what sounds like an 18thcentury operatic lament. Lyrically, alongside a reaffirmation of her black pride politics, Cowboy Carter offers compelling depictions of a volatile marriage in crisis and resolution. And (as Beyoncé demands to know), “If that ain’t country, tell me what is?”
There is a lot going on, from the jerking confrontational surrealist rap of Spaghettii (with young country rapper Shaboozey and veteran black country star Linda Martell) to the psyche Americana balladry of
Alligator Tears and ripping dance floor romp of Ya Ya
(imagine Outkast and Tina Turner performing a garage rock hip hop square dance interpolating Nancy Sinatra’s These Boots Are Made For Walkin’ and the
Beach Boys’ Good Vibrations).
Yet it is all conceptually bound together, honouring the black roots of country (there are significant shout outs and interpolations of Sister Rosetta Tharpe and Chuck Berry), promoting black pride and confronting endemic racism, while pushing the palest of American music genres towards such mindboggling Afrofuturism as the bizarre bounce and switch of Pharrell produced tri-part chant groove Sweet
Honey Buckin. “Put some grits on the stove / Jiffy cornbread, booty corn fed / Body rolls at the rodeo / I’m coming home,” sings this 42-year-old Texas native, yet Beyoncé’s country home exists in a whole different dimension to anything that has claimed this heritage before.
This is the second of three albums in a Renaissance trilogy, and another demonstration of the range of a vastly popular artist who gets bolder and weirder with every release. It is packed with smart lyrics, astonishing singing and bold rhythms teasingly inflected with the acoustic guitars, pedal steel and fiddle signifiers of a genre she and her team of top producers, co-writers and collaborators ripped apart and put back in entirely new shapes. I think it’s a masterpiece, but don’t expect to hear it at the Grand Ole’ Opry any time soon.