Rolling Stone are reporting this morning that Nashville americana artist Will Hoge has announced a politically-charged new album called ‘My American Dream’, a collection of eight songs that touches on social issues including immigration and the homeless. The album will be released October 5th. They report: “In November, the Tennessee native released “Thoughts & Prayers,” a protest song that took politicians and the NRA to task for the increasing amount of mass shootings in the United States. That song also appears on My American Dream, and Hoge released a lyric video for the track this week that juxtaposes the hollow tweets of politicians with hard facts about gun violence.
“In our country there is a mass shooting 9 out of every 10 days on average,” reads a card at the beginning of the video, before a series of tweets calling for the now cliché “thoughts and prayers.” “The people of Sutherland Springs need our prayers right now,” says one from Speaker Paul Ryan. “Just spoke with @POTUS about shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. My thoughts and prayers are with the students, their families and the entire community,” reads another from Florida Governor Rick Scott. The final tweet: one from President Trump, offering his “prayers and condolences” to the families and victims of the Parkland, Florida, shooting.
The video ends with one more sobering fact – “Americans make up about 4.4% of the global population but we own 42% of the world’s guns.”
“This song is really just me working out my own frustrations about our grossly negligent elected officials and about a fear-mongering, bully organization like the NRA,” Hoge told Rolling Stone Country late last year. “They are the worst things about America: a rich organization, led by horrible people, preying on some of the best people in our country with fear and lies, just to grow their own profits.”
Produced by Hoge and recorded in Nashville, My American Dream also includes a re-recorded version of Hoge’s songs calling for the removal of the Confederate flag, “Still a Southern Man.”
The singer will launch a tour this fall, including a string of dates supporting Social Distortion.
Here’s the tracklist for My American Dream:
1. “Gilded Walls”
2. “Stupid Kids”
3. “Still a Southern Man”
4. “Oh Mr. Barnum”
5. “Thoughts & Prayers”
6. “My American Dream”
7. “The Illegal Line”
8. “Nikki’s a Republican Now”
