If Youre Going To Critique Beyoncs Cowboy Carter, At Least Get It Right

Beyonc s Cowboy Carter isnt a reclamation album. Instead, its a declaration of the place Black folks have always had in country music and a middle finger to the industry gatekeepers that have tried to keep us out.

Bey makes this clear on the first track, Ameriican Requim. Its the thesis statement for the album as she sings, Plant my bare feet on solid ground for years / They dont, dont know how hard I had to fight for this.

Beyonc, too, is America. She, too, embodies country.

She spends the next 26 tracks challenging the box Nashville, Tennessee, has put on the genre, blending and twisting it. After all, she told us , This aint a country album. This is a Beyonc album.

She is doing such intentional work out the gate to say this is going to be my critique, my analysis, my understanding, my lived experience as a Black woman in America, journalist Taylor Crumpton said of the lead track on this weeks episode of I Know Thats Right.

On first listen, it feels as if she is Lady Liberty and were looking through her eyes at America.

Listen to the episode here.

Thats gone over many peoples heads, however.

That includes Washington Post writer Chris Richards calling the album botched and claiming that Beyonc made an album about award shows, Azealia Banks claiming that Bey is cosplaying as a white woman and Lily Allen calling Beys foray into country music calculated, specifically with her cover of Dolly Partons classic hit, Jolene. (Never mind the fact that Parton requested Beyonc to cover it .)

The bias behind these opinions is what led the global superstar to make this album in the first place, as she noted in an Instagram post ahead of the release of Cowboy Carter.

What naysayers are missing the point on, however, is that Bey didnt set out to recoup lost awards, pull a gimmick or appeal to a wider fanbase. She made this album to return home to a genre that has tried to deny Black folks contributions to it. Shes standing on the shoulders of Linda Martell, Lesley Riddle and so many others, while creating higher visibility for younger generations of Black country artists like Tanner Adell and Shaboozey. 

Crumpton noted that though Bey made history as the first Black woman to snag the No. 1 spot on Billboards country songs chart, she shouldnt be the only one. If the country industry knows whats best, it will take on the challenge Beyonc has charged it with and uplift more Black artists. 

Beyonc had nothing to prove with this album. Shes not trying to be anything that shes not. She just doesnt fit in your mold of who you think shes supposed to be.

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