Like Jason Isbell, BJ Barham and Sarah Shook, Adeem The Artist is part of a new generation of Southern Americana/Country artists who have managed to write remarkably catchy music influenced by Appalachia and Nashville but wrapped in progressive lyrics and ideals. Nowhere is that more apparent than on Adeem’s latest White Trash Revelry.
Building on many of the same song themes from last year’s Cast-Iron Pansexual, they sing ardently about racism on “Heritage Of Arrogance”; faith on “Going To Hell”; gender identity on “Redneck, Unread Hicks”; and the ubiquity of meth and painkillers on “Painkillers & Magic”. Add to that the generational trauma that is weaved throughout the record, but amazingly there is also plenty of love and revelry to be found as well here, keeping the maudlin moments at bay. Most surprisingly topic wise, “Run This Town,” is a brilliant, everyone on the dance floor Honky Tonk jam about taking over politics (seriously). “Order brunch with a bunch of fascists/We gonna fast with the activists/Do a dance to court the favor of the masses/’Til we finally get ourselves elected.” Everyone from your MAGA hat-wearing, mouth-breathing, neck-bearded uncle to your patchouli-soaked, tied dyed-clad hippie cousin would be hard pressed to hear this song and not be humming it the rest of the day.
“Going To Hell” boasts some of their best lyrics yet with a meeting between the singer and the Devil asking about the deal that was supposedly made with Blues great Robert Johnson (“It’s true I met Robert Johnson, he showed me how the blues could work/But white men would rather give the devil praise than acknowledge a black man’s worth… They play country songs in heaven but in hell we play ‘em loud”).
There is a deeply satisfying mix of songs on this record, from the earnest to the deeply humorous, making for an album to fit just about every mood. A decade into their career, Adeem The Artist is just now hitting their stride and turning out a remarkable collection of songs.
