August 14, 2023

See also: The underground populist workingman’s protest song that’s gotten millions of plays

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A truly beautiful thing happened in the past week, as I hope you’ve already heard.  Oliver Anthony, a singer-songwriter from Farmville, Virginia, captured lighting in a bottle with at recording of his song, “Rich Men North of Richmond,” which quickly proceeded to become the most popular and talked about song in the country. 

There have been many anti-establishment songs from untypical creators in recent years that have made waves, like Loza Alexander’s “Let’s Go Brandon,” or Forgiato Blow’s “Boycott Target.”  A recent example from a more traditional source, perhaps, is Jason Aldean’s “Try That in a Small Town.” 

This is not that.  Anthony’s song is something else entirely.  First and foremost, this is because he’s clearly and excellent musician and it’s just an excellent song, while those others examples are little more than gimmicks.  But another reason why this song may have resonated with so many is that the song exudes an authentic human experience, and it begins with the song’s title. 

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If you were to ask a Nashville advertising exec, or the AI that they’re undoubtedly consulting by now on such questions, they would have both told you that the song could have just as easily been titled, “Dirty Politicians in D.C.” or some such.  In fact, that title would have likely made the title applicable for more listeners across the country, the marketing whiz and tech-bots might say.  There are millions of people in California, for example, who may have no idea that a place called Richmond, Virginia exists, much less its geography or what might lie north of it.

There’s something explicitly human in the choice of Anthony’s title, which is something that soulless advertising execs and AI can’t replicate.  Specifically, the writer is speaking from personal frame of reference, as we humans so often do.  Richmond, Virginia, lies just over 100 miles south of the Washington, D.C.  About 60 miles west-by-southwest of Richmond is Farmville, Virginia.  Richmond is the biggest city near Farmville in relation to D.C., and it’s therefore his unique point of reference to those men he references.

It’s the first of many examples of Oliver’s songwriting nuance, trusting that his audience is smart enough to not require ham-handed efforts to throw red meat to anti-establishment types.  “I wish politicians would look out for miners,” he writes, “and not just minors on an island somewhere.”  It’s an unsubtle but clever reference to both politicians’ disdain for the working class and Jeffrery Epstein’s pedophile island.

But what stands out most about this song is that, while the singer’s passion is unmistakable, it seems to be less an expression of anger than exasperation.  “It’s a damn shame,” he sings, “what the world’s gotten to. For people like me and people like you.  Wish I could just wake up and it not be true, but it is. Oh, it is.  Living in the new world with an old soul…”

He knows his audience.  Because he, like millions of working-class Americans, young and old, is the Forgotten Man in America today.

Before that phrase “Forgotten Man” was corrupted by Franklin D. Roosevelt to mean “the poor man” who desired and needed all the government welfare programs he was pitching during the New Deal, the phrase was first coined in an essay by Yale philosopher William Graham Sumner, who observes that the political schemes of social reformers in government “may always be reduced to this type – that A and B decide what C shall do for D, the “poor man.” I call C the Forgotten Man, because I have never seen that any notice was taken of him in any of the discussions.”