Dispatch from Georgiana, Alabama

从阿拉巴马州乔治安娜州发货

The Monocle Weekly

社会与文化

2024-11-02

12 分钟
PDF

单集简介 ...

We explore the intersection of country music and politics in the US with a report from the birthplace of American singer-songwriter, Hank Williams. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

单集文稿 ...

  • Hello and welcome to the Monocle Weekly.

  • I'm Laura Kramer.

  • On today's show, we are exploring the Hank Williams family dynasty and the intersection of country music and politics in America ahead of the US Election.

  • Here is Poppy Damon.

  • We're driving down the lost highway in Alabama, named after a famous country song.

  • We pull up on a street that looks like something out of a western.

  • Train tracks right through the middle, a rusty bridge, not a soul around.

  • Yeah, it's a big railway track.

  • All the buildings are kind of copper red.

  • There's signs with historical figures pinned up.

  • We're in a place that can genuinely claim to be the birthplace of country music.

  • Georgiana, which is central Alabama, south central Alabama.

  • And we were developed in 1855 and we were a logging town, a cotton town, and then we happened to have this gentleman called Hank Williams learn to play guitar here and grew up here as a boy.

  • Yes, Hank Williams and his musical family, the first family of country.

  • And I want to know what this dynasty can tell us about the changing politics of the South.

  • Country music is music from people from the country.

  • Right.

  • It's agrarian, it's rural.

  • It's not of the cities, it's not of the elite classes.

  • It's everyday music.