I did not assume we might be doing one other episode a couple of mass taking pictures so quickly. But right here we’re.
Mayor John Cooper
00:00:06
As a neighborhood.
This is from a vigil in Nashville.
Mayor John Cooper
00:00:10
Thank you to our artists for sharing the reward of music. You are the custodians of that particular reward.
I’ve been to this place, and I do not imply some sort of memorial after a mass taking pictures, however Nashville particularly. I lived there for just a few years masking the South, and it is not an enormous metropolis. It’s dominant industries of music and publishing could make it really feel even smaller, like everybody is aware of everybody. So when First Lady Jill Biden visited the town to attend a vigil for the taking pictures victims of the Covenant School, it was an absolute given {that a} nation music artist can be there.
Will the circle be unbroken?
By and by, Lord, by and by.
This is Ketch Secor, founding member of the Grammy Award profitable band Old Crow Medicine Show. I did not even get an introduction on the vigil, however that is as a result of everybody within the crowd already is aware of who he’s, not only a well-known musician, however a member of their neighborhood and a dad or mum of two faculty aged youngsters. In truth, the varsity his youngsters attend in East Nashville, he co-based it in 2016. It’s known as the Episcopal School of Nashville.
So I’m sporting two completely different hats right here when a college taking pictures occurs in our city. It’s each as a dad or mum and it is as anyone who’s on the opposite aspect of the decide up line as effectively. When a rustic singer will get off the street, chances are high at 8:00 within the morning on Monday after the large weekend, that man or gal is in line dropping their child off at a college in Nashville, Tennessee. When it involves your house, it is completely different.
And the sky lowered within the sky.
Ketch Secor just lately wrote an op ed for The New York Times that caught our consideration. It was titled Country Music Can Lead America Out of its Obsession with Guns. In it, he requires nation musicians to talk candidly to their audiences about gun tradition. I wished to have him on the present to speak about that op ed, like, can nation music actually assist lead the U.S. out of a gun debate? And what are the stakes for a musician within the style if they really take a stand? And what’s it wish to dwell on the heart of all of it as a dad or mum, educator and musician in Nashville, Tennessee? This is the project. I’m Audie Cornish.
The taking pictures on the Covenant School sort of prompted you to put in writing an op ed for The New York Times. But can you are taking me again to that day somewhat bit? Where had been you while you heard it occurring?
Sure it was on Monday, two weeks in the past, and it was at 10:13 within the morning. I acquired a textual content message from our college lawyer saying, I’m so sorry, and I had no thought what was going on. And prayer hand emoji is attention-grabbing.
So getting an emoji like that or getting the compulsory “are you okay” that all of us begin to ship one another now when there is a taking pictures, particularly at a college, you are saying it it hits you in a spot of what? Panic. Fear. What? What do you are feeling?
It’s. It’s all of the above. It’s. It’s your youngsters. It’s another person’s youngsters. You know, the pinnacle of college was murdered. The connections between our college are very current, and it is as a neighborhood member in Nashville, this surprising realization. Oh, this factor that occurs in different cities has come to our city. And it is come not simply to our city, however to our youngsters, to our the place that’s most sacred.
And even to your nook of that world, Right? Like it did not occur at a public faculty. It did not occur at an enormous college. It occurred at basically a small Christian major faculty. Right. Which is what you what you based one, proper? It had connections.
Yeah. And our faculties are very completely different in that regard and serve completely different populations. However, it you already know, we’re all the identical. We are all each faculty, public, non-public, constitution, each stripe is within the enterprise of believing that youngsters are our future and have to be stewarded and cherished on and guided. And, you already know, that is an actual elemental precept for me.
Can I ask, how outdated are your youngsters and do they go to the varsity you based?
Yeah, they do. And they’re 9 and 11.
So did the varsity you based this Episcopal faculty, did it go into lockdown? Kind of what what did you you all should do because of this?
No, the colleges adjoining to Covenant did, however the others in Nashville didn’t. And so the factor I feel that was so unhappy that first day was the message that went out saying your kids haven’t but been notified. The workers is aware of, the lecturers know, everyone is aware of, all of the mother and father know, everyone is aware of however the youngsters. And we will speak about it tomorrow. But we wished to provide the probability to speak about it first. So in case you can think about a decide up line, anyone who’s who’s been by means of a college taking pictures of their neighborhood is aware of, you already know, the decide up line that first day is filled with tears.
Right. And for individuals who aren’t acquainted with how massive ups and drop offs work as of late in faculties, there’s a line proper, the place like there are sort of they’re chaperoning your child the actually to the curb and also you decide them up. There’s not similar to wandering out of the constructing the place I feel in case you had been a child within the nineties is what you grew up with. Yeah, it is hand handy move off.
That’s proper, Audie. You will need to have youngsters.
Well, the juxtaposition of children stuffed with vibrant pleasure and life and fogeys stuffed with grief and disappointment coming collectively. This assembly to me was very highly effective.
Meaning you are standing on the curb ready to get your child. But each dad or mum’s face is simply drawn.
And each dad or mum is taking a look at each instructor and simply, you already know, holding again tears as is each instructor. But each little one continues to really feel very protected. And but everyone knows as mother and father that no little one is protected any longer as a result of this tragedy is in our yard. It’s come to Nashville, it is come to us, to our youngsters.
I suppose I wish to begin possibly with Wagon Wheel, as a result of if individuals go to look you up, that is perhaps the primary track they find out about. And you even write about it on this op ed. Tell me somewhat bit about the place you had been in your profession while you wrote this.
Sure. Well, Wagon Wheel is my most profitable track.
Headed down South to the Land of the Pines. I’m coming my solution to North Carolina, staring up.
And it is a collaboration with Bob Dylan. I wrote it after I was about 17, going to high school up in New England in a prep faculty known as Exeter, and I used to be had simply realized to play the banjo up there.
So rock me mama like a wagon wheel. Rock me mama, any method you are feeling. Hey mama rock me
You speak about the concept your finest recognized track, Wagon Wheel, is usually blasting out of a truck, so to talk, that has an NRA sticker. And you point out this particularly, and I would like you to speak about why.
When you make the sort of music that I make with a fiddle and a banjo and concord singing and a selected model of songwriting, you are partaking in a neighborhood that is perhaps completely different than your personal form of background, and it is not. Well, there is a prepare going by proper now. This is form of proof..
I keep in mind the prepare. Yeah.
The trains are all the time going by in Nashville.
Just acquired to maintain it going on the podcast. It’ll add somewhat little bit of shade and speaks to what I’m speaking about. You know, the trains are going by. The vans have NRA stickers. You know, after I was a child, there have been Confederate flags in all places. This is The South, y’all. It’s completely different than the opposite elements of the nation now, for higher or for worse. But it’s what it’s.
And while you’re round Nashville and you’ve got political conversations, wherever the individual falls on the spectrum, inevitably somebody makes use of that phrase, Well, that is The South.
Like, that is alleged to cowl numerous issues.
Yeah. And whether or not it is alleged to be that method or, you already know, I feel we’re in a state of appreciable development down south, however the vestiges stay, they usually’re necessary to speak about on this regard, as a result of one of many vestiges is gun tradition, and it is largely thought-about just like the insurgent flag prior to now, simply one thing that exists right here. Deal with it, y’all. When the truth is, we now have all the time had the facility to drop the insurgent flag. There’s one vestige that has been challenged successfully.
And effected change in a method, or no less than increase the sort of societal stakes partaking in sure language.
Totally. And so I see the change in gun tradition is rather like one other step in direction of The South’s evolution.
To my thoughts, nation, Americana, these genres so intently align with their audiences. It’s very very similar to hip-hop, like individuals in hip-hop speak concerning the tradition and their ties to the music, and the music ties to fairly actually the id of the individuals listening. And nation feels very a lot the identical method. But because of this, it has numerous like guidelines. You know, there is a couple traces you they individuals do not such as you to step out of. Can you speak about how that performs out in trendy nation?
Sure. Well, at present’s nation singer may not come from The South and is school educated. So that they are in has already modified the stereotype of who sings nation music. You know, it is it is not coal miners anymore. The coal miner’s daughter like all of us love Loretta, however that is not who’s on primary proper now. So that a part of it has modified so much. But what hasn’t modified a lot are the attitudes of the viewers.
Which to be clear. The nation music viewers is also wealthier and are determination makers and our usually managers, there’s been form of like numerous analysis into many people who find themselves within the viewers, and the viewers in all probability seems somewhat completely different than individuals count on as effectively.
Well, I did not know to enter this, however however I’m excited that we’re, Audie, as a result of, you already know, nation music actually particularly, and to make clear, modern nation music on the radio is an actual protected house for us to not speak about political divisiveness and never speak about issues of of substance. But as an alternative we’re all form of studying the Pulp Fiction collectively. And it is it is
Which is why it is standard, proper? I imply, in the course of the pandemic, I heard the expansion of listening to the music or streaming possibly was up 15%. It was larger than every other style.
People welcome that protected house.
Travel story. It’s you already know, it is very a lot tales, intergenerational household tales. That’s the sort of stuff that goes primary is the track about grandpa and what an excellent man he was and the way if we could possibly be somewhat bit extra like him, then the world can be a greater place. So this form of, you already know, hallmark sort of these beliefs which are tossed round may not be that lifelike for at present’s actuality of, you already know, I labored I’m a part of a world financial system working two jobs. And, you already know, I’m hoping my youngsters are going to go get out of state tuition or no matter. And but we nation music actually offers in nostalgia. And that nostalgia is a an necessary antidote to the entire ache that one can witness within the click on of a mouse.
Right. So how does gun. Culture work together with that nostalgia, storytelling, since you’re saying in a method that that is constructed into the music, too.
Johnny Cash singing I Shot a Man in Reno to Watch Him Die. Hank Jr Singing about. Yeah, I’d wish to spit some seaside nut in that dude’s eye and shoot him with my outdated 45 as a result of a rustic boy can survive. This is a solution to for nation music to retain authority in a altering world. And guns–
But do you hear it within the trendy music? Are there? You do not have to pick any artist. But do individuals nonetheless speak about that?
No, Audie. And that is the factor. We do not speak about weapons. If we do, it is a track about I took my boy attempting to find the primary time. It’s once more, dealing within the nostalgia. What it is not saying is I’ve acquired an AR-15 in my assortment. But the truth is that many, many listeners do. And but it is a protected house the place they don’t seem to be confronted by the music to a altering actuality. Instead, they’re allowed to say, I taught my little one the way to, you already know, I imply, after I was a child within the eighties, like I went chicken hunt with Dad, I realized the way to fireplace a weapon. I realized the way to clear a weapon. These issues are necessary to the ways in which gun tradition could be a optimistic, however the protected house is that we’re not speaking about what it means in at present’s America. Instead, we’re just about hanging in yesterday’s.
So what’s it like for artists comparable to your self to lift this concern?
People maintain saying, thanks for being courageous. And I’m like. You know who’s courageous is the child that pulled the fireplace alarm, you already know, within the hallway underneath gunfire in our city in a college, a child that was a 3rd grader. Now, that is courageous. All I’m doing is simply I’m a singer and I’m going to sing concerning the stuff that is actual. I’m a author, and I’m going to inform what I see.
I do not wish to learn an excessive amount of into the zoom, however I. Are you getting emotional speaking about that?
Oh, yeah. I imply, I’ve been I’ve been crying for 2 weeks, ya’ll, prefer it’s… When this involves your city they usually bury the identical age child as yours. And then after which, like, whereas the graves are nonetheless recent, the information cycle strikes on to Stormy Daniels, and that is the truth. It’s like, Good God, the place will we dwell? What will we not care about youngsters in any respect? It’s simply over. So that is my method of claiming it is not over and it will not be over till these deaths, these three deaths of American kids gunned down within the third grade, till they imply one thing, that is when it will be over.
More with Ketch Secor in only a second.
You are demanding a brand new sort of motion come out of the south. And that it partly be led by people who find themselves cultural figures as effectively, not simply politicians, individuals comparable to your self. Why do you assume it may make a distinction?
Well, I feel that Nashville stands uniquely poised to guide a response to the varsity taking pictures epidemic.
But why do you assume that? Right? We simply watched the Tennessee State House expel two members as a result of that they had a protest associated to gun coverage. Expel, not censure, not reprimand. Try to kick them out. So what what to your thoughts leads you to assume that?
Well, Nashville, even supposing the state legislature is what it’s, Nashville is a really progressive metropolis. And I’m not saying that Tennessee goes to cleared the path. I’m saying Nashville.
Yeah, however is not that the powerful half? If in all these states and it is not simply Tennessee, you’ve got acquired these blue cities, these little blue dots in a sea of pink, and by pink I imply very conservative, very professional-gun, pro-Second Amendment legislatures. This appears like an uphill battle. What you are calling for.
And I do know it is price it. I do not wish to as a result of everyone knows it is price it. But I would like I wish to perceive why you assume nation musicians are in any method uniquely positioned to have this dialog.
Well, and I wish to I recognize you difficult this Audie. First factor I wish to say is that altering segregation was an uphill battle in Tennessee. And and when Nashville within the early Nineteen Sixties, within the late Fifties stated its first foot ahead, this was the proving floor, different elements of the South had been too unsafe. But individuals gathered in Nashville, a metropolis of faculties, a metropolis of progressive thought within the South to interact in nonviolent civil disobedience. This is the place John Lewis got here. This is the place the Freedom Riders first cease was.
Their trainings, proper, with James Lawson and at Vanderbilt.
All of that coaching at Fisk and Vanderbilt occurred proper right here in Nashville, Tennessee. That reveals our means as a as a neighborhood to exist outdoors of the state. Now, similar to in that point, the state legislator stated, what are you speaking about? That’s not going to occur in our state. We forged the deciding vote on on ladies’s suffrage. I imply, Tennessee has been a bellwether place in these two different cases of nice significance. This is the third. This is the a part of the demise knell of the outdated South, which goes to have to vary. You know, 50 years from now I feel we will be wanting again at these couple of years because the deciding time for a assault weapons ban within the United States.
Again, I wish to deliver it to the query about nation music artists, particularly mainstream ones who given what we all know concerning the music, primary, have been socially punished for activism by what we name Music Row, by music radio, by nation music radio specifically, which nonetheless has a really sort of robust grip in a method programmers do, and even current historical past. Right. When you concentrate on the Dixie Chicks, and so forth., their complete story is a narrative of being ostracized for his or her activism.
You know, for a man like me, I’m not beholden to too many individuals in any respect, however I’m not a mainstream. I’m not on the Jumbotron, you already know, I’m not on the awards present with the highest ten performers of the 12 months.
Do you want these individuals for the motion you are speaking about?
They have a very far attain and the facility to speed up an inevitable motion to vary this for our youngsters. And I’m asking them by means of this piece and in addition nose to nose in my neighborhood, by means of conversations of textual content. You know, I’ve reached out to so many singers prior to now two weeks.
And what sort of textual content you ship.
Hey, I’m simply reaching out to all my Nashville music neighborhood within the wake of the taking pictures and sharing this story that I wrote that got here out at present in The Times. If you get a sec, please have a look.
What’s been probably the most optimistic response? What’s been probably the most irritating one?
The most irritating one is silence. I say within the op ed piece that I feel silence is complicity. I went into the studio and I and I recorded a brand new track on the topic. Since the taking pictures, which is just two weeks in the past there have been so some ways to be engaged with this horrible story, and it is highly effective answer.
I imply, the explanation why I’m asking is as a result of your op ed stated one thing fairly particular, proper? That there are artists who’re drained at being on the sort of mercy of the whims of fearmongers, you stated, and that they are prepared to talk to an impressionable viewers. And as a result of different genres, like we talked about hip hop earlier or pop, they do wade into societal points. They might be confrontational about politics. It’s not like there is not a mannequin on the market. So I suppose what would it not take, do you assume, for individuals in your business? To begin to do one thing comparable, which is which is, in impact, what you are calling for.
It is starting and it is, I feel, in its infancy, nevertheless it’s already began.
And so it is about fanning the flames and constructing an enormous bonfire out of what is already crackling kindling. For instance, we have a profit live performance right here in Nashville that helps Covenant School. And while you take a look at the the roster, who’s on the marquee, it is not the standard Americana of us who all the time say, you already know, we stand with youngsters, we get up towards gun violence. Instead, it is primary chart toppers. They are there. They have put their hat into the ring.
But is it as a result of it is is it going to be a protected house from politics? If it is a second of a memorial, is that what makes it okay for an enormous artist to be there? Right. Because no person’s going to stand up and say we should always have gun management.
There’s nothing however up right here as a result of we we now have began on the very baseline the place music popping out of Nashville on the radio says nothing about violence towards kids in our faculties or about the necessity to rethink the forms of weaponry that’s related with the Second Amendment. Kelsea Ballerini talked about it on an award present. These are the sorts of issues that when anyone takes one step and the motion can rapidly observe it, then the following step is not as exhausting to make. And what I’m asking for is that subsequent step. You know, I’ve gotten numerous suggestions from my viewers. And like I say in an op ed piece, you already know, I see the NRA sticker on the again of lot of vans blaring in my tunes. So, you already know, and we’re out on the street with Hank Jr. this summer time. So, I imply, I’m I’m used to taking part in to an viewers that’s our nation people. But I like my nation people viewers. And I and I would like to have the ability to be actual with them. I can transfer freely in each of the areas that the 2 massive silos within the nation. Like, I would go to work in a single silo and are available house and the opposite one. And I’m good with that as a result of I like these individuals.
What is your message to these artists who’re simply nonetheless very reluctant?
Country music has an ideal future in these instances to swing out previous the fences which have corralled it in so tightly. That I imagine on this style. And I imagine that it has the facility to hold that fact. You know, it is very a lot rooted in a gospel custom of of the lamentation, the calling out to the good spirits. Help us, Lord. We’re simply your kids. We do not know shit. We’re we’re dying down right here. Help!
Can you speak concerning the track that you’ve got written out of this second?
New materials? You know, usually, similar to I’m in a songwriting temper right here, I’m in a a second in time with numerous completely different alternatives as a author to interact on this, whether or not it is, you already know, writing the correct caption for {a photograph} on Instagram or writing an op ed piece for The New York Times or being on this podcast with you, Audie. There’s so some ways to decide on my phrases proper now and try to have them be resonant for the ache that we’re feeling in Nashville, Tennessee and across the nation as a result of we’re simply so drained, mother and father, that our youngsters aren’t protected of their faculties. What meaning for me as a songwriter is that I even have the possibility to put in writing new music about this and to place my cash the place my mouth is. So I acquired a brand new track that is popping out known as Louder Than Guns. That’s yeah, I simply recorded it two days in the past.
Give me a way of the tune or lyrics.
Well, gosh, I really feel like I should not even introduced it up as a result of it is so…anytime you get a you already know, individuals are cagey about their new stuff!
You’re dealing with a dude that wept by means of the entire songwriting course of. Let me sing it for you.
Ketch Secor is the daddy of two youngsters in Nashville, Tennessee. He’s additionally a singer, songwriter and founding member of the band Old Crow Medicine Show.
Now The Assignment is a manufacturing of CNN Audio. Our producers are Madeleine Thompson,Jennifer Lai, Lori Galarreta, Carla Javier, and Dan Bloom. Our affiliate producers are Isoke Samuel and Allison Park. Our senior producers are Matt Martinez and Haley Thomas. Dan Dzula is our technical director. Steve Lickteig is our govt producer. Special due to Katie Hinman. I’m Audie Cornish and thanks for listening.
Sending that one out to Louisville at present.
Ketch, thanks a lot for sharing that with us.
Yeah, we acquired. We acquired to. We acquired to do it, y’all.