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Red Neck, Red Flag - Left Wing Country

Aye, if we change the definition to include just any folk this thread'd be a lot easier. Does Lil Nas X count?
my daughter asked me, smiling, why i was listening to lil nas x ...

hm, i think not, although it's clear he's trying, what with rodeo and old town road ft brc...
- maybe later?
Elvis and Ray Charles both did country albums, not sure how rebel they were, mind.
both got exellent country credentials, mr charles finally got induced into the hall of fame this year. dunno much bout his politics, renowned civil right activist but played in south africa during the boycott.

as for mr presley - of course he was a rebel, & unofficially, comrade aaron is still doing important work for the posadists, travelling in his pink spaceship, making contacts with the intergalactic anarcho-communist society.

our day will come.

but apart from short lapses like 'in the ghetto' & the brilliant allegory of capitalist society that is 'suspicious minds' he kept his official apolitical front perfectly, though it took a heavy toll on his body...


back to the thread.
 
countrys roots are full of socialists & union activist, woody, pete seeger, joe hill, sarah ogan gunning, aunt molly jackson...

barbara dane is still alive, 94 years old.







emmylou harris, alabama & kathy mattea, kentucky gets to represent the next generation, with songs about growing up poor & capitalisms destruction of nature








courtney marie andrews, arizona wonders what the fuck happened to her country.

 
Not exactly well known, and more Bluegrass than Country maybe, but a good 'ole knee slapper nonetheless:

 
Not exactly well known, and more Bluegrass than Country maybe, but a good 'ole knee slapper nonetheless:


good one, well within the limits of the thread.

He was a Christian Zionist
i know he was deeply religious, and the internet tells me he made several trips to israel & that he got a 'peace price' from the jnf- tell me more?

willie nelson:





 
Found this article today, which feels quite relevant:
Main names I got from it were the Wooden Shoe Ramblers:


And Tom Breiding. Not listened to either yet so dunno if they're any good or where they stand on the folk-country-bluegrass spectrum.
 
everybody's working for the man again - kane, welch, kaplan (2004)



dunno much bout these guys really, country journeymen couple of levels below the really big names, but this one is a brilliant song from a brilliant album - 'you can't save everybody.' (the follow-up, lost john dean, is almost as good)

song's written by kevin welch, who seems a good guy, cowboy hippie/longhaired redneck, born in california, raised in oklahoma. talented children as well, dustin welch, musician too & savannah welch musician (the trishas)& actor (barbara gordon in the titans)

kieran kane wrote the anti-war song (& history lesson) 'just like that' , another explicitly political song on the same album. he's recorded with emmylou harris & lucinda williams, so he's gotta be a good guy...




fats kaplan plays a mean fiddle.
 
Oh, maybe a bit over on the country-rock side of things, just remembered when the Dils went country and became Rank and File:


Sadly the Rank and File version of "Sound of the Rain" changed the line about the cops, but they still put a picket line in the music video:
 
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