No album this year will receive more attention than Beyoncé's COWBOY CARTER.
The Texan singer is a culture-shifting force who makes records that serve as powerful artistic statements, and sometimes delve into the political.
Since Beyoncé announced the new album during this year's Super Bowl, there has been plenty of speculation about how COWBOY CARTER will sound, what its songs will say, and where this new direction will take Beyoncé in 2024.
Music experts and major Beyoncé fans Kath Devaney, Sose Fuamoli, Mawunyo Gbogbo, and Zan Rowe have been listening to nothing else this weekend and have unpacked this epic new album to give you the lowdown on its brightest moments.
It's an impossible ask but what's your favourite song on Cowboy Carter right now?
Sose Fuamoli: Protector is the song I have kept coming back to. The intimacy of this song, essentially a love letter, is what makes this otherwise simply arranged track land with the same level of impact as any track on the back half of this album.
It's a great example of how Beyoncé doesn't need overblown production or musical crutches to relate an emotionally charged message. It is such a sweet ode to her daughter Rumi — adding her as a credited artist is incredibly savvy. Set up that generational wealth, Mama!
Mawunyo Gbogbo: I declare Tyrant a hit. It hits you in the chest with that beat — instantly and conclusively. It hits a raw nerve with those heartbreakingly defiant lyrics. It hits that sweet spot of musicality as it straddles both country and hip hop. I couldn't get enough of the bass and got lost in that 808 and violin.
I believe The-Dream (Umbrella, Rihanna) is underrated. Listed here as one of the writers, I can hear his influence pulsating from this song. And Dolly Parton on the intro? What more could we ask for?
Kath Devaney: If it had to be one, Ya Ya is unequivocally one of the greatest tracks. The samples and interpolations alone signal the kind of on-brand defiance and freedom Carter is adored for. Nancy Sinatra's These Boots Are Made For Walkin', The Beach Boys' Good Vibrations and Mickey & Sylvia's Love Is Strange are cleverly intertwined with bold, bluesy riffs and percussion that could raise Chuck Berry from the grave. It's unapologetically brash, with fun and forceful fervour highlighting Carter's rampaging vocal, and pays homage to pioneering southern black female artists such as Koko Taylor and Big Mama Thornton.
Zan Rowe: It's quite the flex to sample so many big artists. Imagine what the price of including The Beatles, Beach Boys, Dolly Parton, Chuck Berry, Patsy Cline, Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood would have been. What a boss move.
Right now, Sweet ★ Honey ★ Buckiin' brings me so much joy.
It captures the spirit of an album that defies categorisation; interpolating a Patsy Cline lyric while taking you to the club. Showcasing Virginia hip hop/country musician Shaboozey while laying down some of her own best raps. Capturing her wealthy contemporaries' lifestyle while reasserting her Creole country roots.
"On a trail ride to the Zydeco / I'm coming home."
And addressing that Grammys Album of the Year snub most directly. There are so many Easter eggs in this song, but I love it cos it slaps. It just slaps.
Do you have a favourite lyric yet?
Sose: "Double cross me, I'm just like my father / I am colder than Titanic water."
Daughter is psychotic and I love it.
Mawunyo: "They keep sayin' that I ain't nothin' like my father / But I'm the furthest thing from choir boys and altars / If you cross me, I'm just like my father / I am colder than Titanic Waters"
That chorus has me shook.
Zan: "Baby, if you ain't got no ritz get the f**k up out the south / Life is comin' at me fast, keep my Bible on the dash."
Ya Ya takes no prisoners while charming the hell out of us at the same time.
Kath: As a mother, Protector hits me in the feels like a bullet out of a gun barrel.
"And I will lead you down that road if you lose your way/ Born to be a protector/ Even though I know, some day, you're gonna shine on your own/ I will be your projector."
BANG.
Dolly Parton, Miley Cyrus, Post Malone, and Willie Nelson are just a few of the special guests on Cowboy Carter. Which guest appearance hit you hardest?
Sose: My favourite guest appearances are the women we hear on Blackbiird. Tanner Adell, Reyna Roberts, Tiera Kennedy, and Brittney Spencer are black female country songwriters and artists who are about to get way more exposure through this project — deservedly so.
The harmonies are beautiful and their inclusion on a song like Blackbiird is a considered statement by Beyoncé and makes Paul McCartney's original lyrics take almost a full circle meaning: "Blackbird singing in the dead of night / Take these broken wings and learn to fly / All your life, you were only waiting / For this moment to arise."
Kath: I agree with Sose on this one. The significance and context of Blackbiird is history in the (re)making. The impetus for the album revolving around Carter's experience of exclusion, paired with the divisiveness of the times flamed by racial and political unrest, give flight to this considered rework of Paul McCartney's original.
Zan: So many highlights, and please Bey – release the full credits.
Hearing Miley Cyrus's guest spot for the first time felt like it'd been with us forever. Their harmonies soar so perfectly, which is wild knowing this collab was very last minute, recorded just after this year's Grammys (remember Beyoncé watching from the front table with her cowboy hat on, as Miley performed?).
There's a lot of brilliant production on this album, but here it's all about their voices: front, centre, strong, and full of life.
There's something poetic about the marrying of their stories too. A country music dynasty with Miley, daughter of Billy Ray, goddaughter of Dolly Parton; a kid who grew up idolising Beyoncé. And here Beyoncé extends a hand and they both stand tall rewriting what country, what music is, in 2024.
Mawunyo: When Post Malone is featured on a track, it's usually a big skip from me, but he's well-cast here. Levii's Jeans is a definite favourite. Reminiscent of Ginuwine's In Those Jeans, it's an ode to getting as close as you can to your lover. Rather than being in those jeans though, this song is about being those jeans. And presumably, we're talking about a snug fit. A fashionably fun track.
This is being called Beyoncé's 'country album' – does it feel like a country album?
Kath: Ah, the age-old debate. Instrumentally, Cowboy Carter could be said to be more authentically country than some of the highly produced artists and songs in the current charts. There, I said it.
Genres evolve, as do people. Art that is of value is complex, has deep resonance and an innate depth of reference. Who owns it? We do, all of us.
I think the conversations being had about what is and is not "country music" are more important than putting any one thing, sound, or person into a box. We are multitudes, and Bey is here to remind us of that.
Zan: Beyoncé said it herself: "This is not a country album, this is a Beyoncé album." And her ubiquity proves that genre bends to her, not the other way around.
The album is long: 27 tracks across 78 minutes. Is there such a thing as too much new Beyoncé?
Sose: This album is not without its filler tracks. A final pass to trim some fat never goes astray. In saying that, each track serves a purpose, even if some of them don't grab me as much as the others.
When I was listening to this the first time through, it was hard not to compare it to the seamless run of transitions and flow of [2022 album] Renaissance.
However, this album benefits from its lengthy run time because of the depth of storytelling direction Cowboy Carter takes. Beyoncé doesn't rush things at the best of times, but I don't think this was ever meant to be a back-to-back, club-primed record like Renaissance or some of her previous work.
This is an album lover's album, that's the beauty of it. You need to sit with it and digest the music in all its shades.
Zan: I baulked a little when I saw the running time. But, having listened to it on loop, there's little I would cut. Not because every song is brilliant, but because Beyoncé has become an artist who celebrates and delivers the art of the album. Each song, each transition, leads seamlessly to the next. The sequencing makes so much sense, and who would want to lose Willie Nelson popping up as your friendly country radio DJ?
This feels like an epic story with acts, and you can't get to one before climbing the ladder of the previous. It also feels like an album that will continue to reveal itself over time and repeated listens.
Kath: It's Beyoncé's world and we're just living in it. If Beyoncé Knowles Carter wanted to release a one-minute album or a five-hour album I would be eternally grateful I was alive the day they dropped into the world.
Mawunyo: I did not even notice. A testament to its lack of superfluity.
What was the biggest surprise for you when you first played through the album?
Zan: Spaghettii. Eleven songs into her "country" album, Beyoncé unleashes a brilliant rap that further cements her place in hip hop as one of today's best MCs. I did a full double take at the speaker when it landed.
Even better that it was preceded by black country singer Linda Martell reminding us that genres can confine us. And Beyoncé exploding with "I ain't no regular singer, now come get everythin' you came for." Boom.
Mawunyo: Spaghettii took me back to Carmen: A Hip Hopera, which I have on DVD. (Yes, I'm for real. I love that sh**.) Nice to hear Beyoncé spit rhymes again. It wasn't a track I was expecting on Cowboy Carter but it fits like a pair of rhinestone boots slung over a holographic horse.
Sose: How clean Post Malone sounded — that boy came correct for Beyoncé on Levii's Jeans!
But really, I think I was surprised by how Jolene didn't really slap for me at all. I love the fact Dolly Parton has such a clear presence on the album and I like the fact Beyoncé did her own thing with it from a lyrical standpoint, but I couldn't really vibe with it knowing an album like [Beyoncé's 2016 album] Lemonade exists.
It's fine, I guess? Just didn't really have the impact I thought it would. Definitely a filler track for me.
Kath: The carefully curated features didn't feel tokenistic. Instead they felt considered, intentional and audacious.
Despite the experience she had when flexing her first toe into the country waters via The Chicks' collaboration Daddy Lessons and the subsequent backlash she faced, Beyoncé harnessed that hatred and rejection, riding high on her tassled "surfboard", unapologetically and with the utmost respect and exaltation.
What messages do you think Beyoncé is conveying, broadly, with this album?
Sose: Man, so many.
I love that Beyoncé has acknowledged confidently that she's past making records that match a moment; she's producing records that reflect an always-diverse black music culture, records that are focused on legacy.
During the first listen, particularly around tracks like Ameriican Requiem, II Hands II Heaven and Just For Fun, I was thinking, "This is her To Pimp A Butterfly". Not to say that this album is politically and socially charged in the same way as Kendrick Lamar's seminal 2015 effort, but Cowboy Carter holds a mirror up to Black culture in a way that people – diehard fans and casual ones alike – will remember as being one of Beyoncé's clearest messages of pride and reclamation.
Mawunyo: I couldn't help but hear echoes of Lemonade. There's Jolene, of course. I love Beyoncé's take on this Dolly Parton classic. Out with the pleading, in with a clear deterrent on why you don't want that smoke. And I could also hear Lemonade in Tyrant.
If I had to guess at an overall message though it would be f*** genres.
Kath: Honestly, Cowboy Carter isn't just country enthused, it's almost punk in nature. This album is a big "F*** You" to the establishment. For anyone trying to pave their own path or knock on a door and only to told they can't come in, this is for them. Music and art are universal. They exist long after the person creating them or indeed categorising them does.
Beyoncé has done an incredible and singular job at recognising Black history, her history, and the future history of artists and genres yet to come.
Zan: Beyoncé is telling us that "the canon" is not what we think it is, just because we've been told that in the main. She has long been an album artist, exploring the hidden stories of cultural history through a personal prism, and with every one of these releases she stirs up conversation and makes us dig a little deeper beyond what we were told. What an extraordinary power, and what a way to use it.
But it's not just about platforming, Beyoncé has skin in the game here too. As much as she felt erasure following her 2016 Country Music Awards performance (reportedly the catalyst for Cowboy Carter), Beyoncé addresses the erasure of Black country music all over this album. The genres, the scenes, and the people who have never been celebrated and worse, actively excluded. And she goes one further by blasting apart the genre walls themselves.
In doing so, she confirms we should never presume what she can, or will, do in the future. Beyoncé didn't bend to country, she bent the very idea of country to her.
COWBOY CARTER is out now.