She Went Country...

When Our Fave Pop Stars Giddy Up 🤠

Beyoncé has officially yee-haw’d on to the country bandwagon, y’all! She took those daddy lessons and is prepared to give us cuntry with her next act, dropping her duo of country tracks “TEXAS HOLD ‘EM” and “16 CARRIAGES.” I like Beyonce in the way that I love “I Care,” but it took me a month to listen to RENAISSANCE, yet I know all the words to Destiny’s Child’s “Bug a Boo.” But when I heard the pluck of steel and percussive slam of “16 CARRIAGES” on some rando’s Instagram story, I paused with intrigue.

When a pop star goes country, it is often a desperate cry for help. An act to claw out of obscurity. A pander to an untapped white folk demographic that doesn’t care about your racist tweets from a pre-fame 2008 era. A crossover that reeks as a scream for attention. A pop-to-country crossover isn’t as glamorously celebrated as one from country to pop. On the country-to-pop expressway, successful passengers include Taylor Swift, Shania Twain—and almost Kacey Musgraves (Justice for star-crossed). And from pop to country, we were force-fed Jessica Simpson and, in no one’s opinion than mine, blessed with Lady Gaga’s best album, Joanne.

But that could never be Beyoncé because she’s Beyoncé. “16 CARRIAGES” is autobiographically vulnerable, soulfully melodious, and has grabbed me by the throat and fucked me in the ear. I don’t want it to stop.

I have never loved a Beyoncé rollout as much as I have for ACT II. Probably because since she changed the game with that digital drop, she hasn’t participated in a typical rollout. Why now? It’s interesting that she would descend from her unreachable Goddess cloud to be a plebeian pop star again with a country record. So it begs the question—is ACT II Beyoncé’s version of the pop star going country reach and pander?

As I rake up most of Southern California’s “16 CARRIAGES” Spotify streams, I fondly remember my absolute favorite pop-to-country attempt—Hilary Duff’s 2014 single “All About You.”

Released as the follow-up to her quasi-comeback single—the folk-hinted pop track “Chasing the Sun”—“All About You” is a banjo strumming, hand-clapping, stomping country banger. Although a hit in my house, it middled on Billboard’s Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles chart, ultimately leading to an entire scrapping of her intended folk-pop album, This Heart. Lucky for us (most likely just me, a handful of Disney fags, and girls who are now staunch Stanley Cup devotees), the shelved album illegally lives on YouTube.

You’re probably reading this and thinking, “I thought this essay was going to be about Beyoncé. Why is he giving me a history lesson in Hilary Duff?” It’s because I tricked you, and my intention this entire time was to actually just share with you this Duff era that never was…

Enjoy!