Beyoncé Rides Into Her Country Music Era With “Cowboy Carter”
by Matthew Allen
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March 29, 2024

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Beyoncé Rides Into Her Country Music Era With “Cowboy Carter”

Beyoncé Rides Into Her Country Music Era With
Credit: Blair Caldwell/Parkwood Entertainment LLC

This ain’t a Country album. This is a Beyoncé album.” 

When I read this on 32-time Grammy winner Beyoncé’s album announcement via Instagram, my curiosity piqued. Social media somewhat predicted that Act II of Beyoncé’s three-act trilogy would be a country album, following the house-influenced Act I that was “Renaissance,” and I was intrigued. 

I knew that Beyoncé received backlash from the predominantly white country music community after performing her stand-out “Lemonade” cut, “Daddy Lessons,” with the then-named Dixie Chicks at the 2016 CMA Awards. With that in mind, knowing that country was the focus of this new album, I took it to be the ultimate revenge play for Beyoncé. 

Although I don’t consider myself a card-carrying member of the Bey Hive, I’ve always respected Beyoncé for her drive, innovation, and intense ambition to move culture over moving units.

Ever since Beyoncé released her self-titled album in 2013, she’s established a sonic and cultural aesthetic that’s become a signature on her subsequent projects and a beacon for Black storytelling and pride. “Beyoncé” was self-affirming and confident. “Lemonade” tells us a linear story of betrayal and forgiveness. “Renaissance” celebrated a culture anchored by the Black LGBTQ+ community. 

 

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Part of me expected “Cowboy Carter” to be Beyoncé singing over traditional country compositions. But after the first listen, it became clear that country is a color she’s utilizing for the canvas that is her catalog and artistic story. 

Like so many others, I stayed up until 12 a.m. EST to hear the album. It didn’t take too long for it to take effect on fans. One such fan, activist Brittany Packnett Cunningham, posted on Instagram, “I listened to COWBOY CARTER at midnight. This morning when I rose, I thanked God for making me a Black girl.” 

“This album made me feel the way I felt the first time I read Nikki Giovanni’s ‘Ego Trippin,’” she continued. “The way I felt when I met Della Reese, who hugged a young me and said, “just a pretty chocolate thing, aren’t you? The way I felt when I’d watch Diahann Carroll galavant and Tina Turner be…Tina Turner.”

“All of it convicts me to stand ten toes down in the inheritance of Black womanhood. Of the ways we reject fear, break boundaries, carry the lineage and redefine power. Ours is an inheritance that redefines power to set everyone free—but compels us to free ourselves first. To see ourselves as full and complete. To accept and affirm first everything beautiful we bring. To give our progeny the permission our ancestors gave us: to LIVE, and live freely.

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The album is making Black listeners, and Black women in particular, feel invincible and empowered. Another fan, @writingthewrong via Twitter (I know it’s called ‘X’ now, but who cares? It’s Twitter forever. Fight me), wrote, “This might be dramatic but I really don’t care. Beyonce makes me feel like I can do anything. The first thing I said after finishing the album last night was ‘Oh! We can just do whatever we want! We can make ANYTHING we want to make. We can just. Decide. And do it.’”

 

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Beyoncé throws convention out the window at the off-set, starting the album with four consecutive slow-tempo tracks. The only artist I knew who could pull that off was The Jackson Five, who started their 1971 album, “Maybe Tomorrow,” with three ballads (two included the title track and “Never Can Say Goodbye”). 

It’s hard enough to have the main opener as a ballad, but the first four? That’s iconic, for sure. 

Its opener, “Ameriican Requiem,” is a dramatic overture that calls for the end of cultural restraint and a problematic status quo. “Protector” is a lush, acoustic lullaby to her children (Rumi Carter makes a cameo at the beginning) and a subtle reminder of country music’s gospel roots.

Things speed up when “Texas Hold ‘Em,” the album’s lead single, shows up. The No. 1 Billboard Hot 100 single is a fun romp that can be played at big-city nightclubs as much as a down-home juke joint. “Tyrant” incorporates fiddle-style violin playing over an infectious trap beat. If I was A&R at Columbia, I’d make this the next single. 

Indeed, my favorite tracks on the project were the faster ones, particularly “Ya Ya.” It picks up where Renaissance left up, with a proudly profane ‘Yoncé declaring, “Those petty ones can’t f**k with me, ‘cause I’m a clever girl.” The track builds, adding finger snaps, hand claps, and snare drums on top of the acoustic guitar one at a time as Beyoncé sings with various voicings, interpolating The Beach Boys’ “Good Vibrations” for good measure. It’s reminiscent of the Black icons who came before her, including Tina Turner and Little Richard. 

 

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Other fast-paced stand-outs are “Sweet Honey Buckiin” and “Spaghettii,” with both featuring guest verses from Black country rapper Shaboozey. “Spaghettii” is Beyonce’s most robust attempt at rapping, and is also her most effective performance doing so. 

The album includes two covers: The Beatles’ “Blackbiird” and Dolly Parton’s “Jolene.” The production and execution of each song couldn’t be any more different, yet they fit perfectly on the album’s sonic and thematic disposition. 

“Blackbiird” is performed nearly identically to the Paul McCartney-penned original, with some light strings added. A song written as a reaction to the Civil Right Movement of the 1960s, “Blackbiird” is a soothing declaration of comfort, complete with Black women country singers Tanner Adell, Tiera Kennedy, Brittney Spencer and Reyna Roberts on the track. 

Meanwhile, Beyoncé’s altered lyrics to Parton’s “Jolene” conveys a more authoritative message that women today, Black women especially, can get behind. The original version finds Parton “begging” a girl named Jolene not to steal her man away, Beyoncé sings, “I’m warning you,” along with other lyrical changes to reflect the more assertive approach. 

Black country music pioneer Linda Martell, who is featured on the album on a track named after her, best encapsulates “Cowboy Carter” at the intro of “Spaghettii:”

“Genres are a funny little concept, aren’t they? 

In theory, they have a simple definition that’s easy to understand. 

But in practice, well, some may feel confined.”

This album illustrated that Beyoncé is beyond categorization, especially after “Renaissance” preceded it as Act I. Act II is just as defiant and unapologetic as the last, while also honoring Black southern heritage and history. 

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