Beyoncé’s new album “Cowboy Carter” gives a huge shoutout to Alabama.
In the first track, “Ameriican Requiem,” the Grammy-winner references her father Mathew Knowles’ hometown of Gadsden.
Beyoncé released her eighth album, “act ii: Cowboy Carter,” a duology in a trilogy of acts, which the pop star has teased since the initial release of her seventh album, “act i: Renaissance.” The album dropped Friday at midnight and features a total of 27 tracks with heavy nods to country music.
The lyric: “The grand-baby of a moonshine man, Gadsden, Alabama.” Listen to the song in the video above.
Knowles was born and raised in Gadsden until he moved to Nashville to attend Fisk University. He moved to Houston in 1976 to work for the Xerox corporation until he gave that up to manage Beyoncé and the pop music group Destiny’s Child.
The singer also references her mother Tina Knowles’ side of the family in Galveston, Texas, and Louisiana.
“Got folks down in Galveston rooted in Louisiana,” she sings.
The album also features country music legends Dolly Parton, Willie Nelson, and Linda Martell, as well as pop stars Miley Cyrus and Post Malone. She also incorporates other country artists, Tanner Adell, Tiera Kennedy, Reyna Roberts, Brittney Spencer, Willie Jones, and Shaboozey. She even includes her daughter Rumi Carter on the track, “Protector”.
Beyoncé surprised fans during the Super Bowl in February with a commercial with Verizon Wireless (featuring Samford graduate Tony Hale), where she announced the release of “Cowboy Carter” and simultaneously released two songs from the album, “16 Carriages” and “Texas Hold ‘Em”.
Ten days before the album released, she made a post to Instagram explaining that the album has been five years in the making, and was birthed from an experience that she had years ago where she didn’t feel welcomed and it was clear that she wasn’t. Fans speculate that this came from her performance of “Daddy Lessons” at the Country Music Awards in 2016 with the Dixie Chicks.
She also ended the Instagram post saying, “This ain’t a Country album. This is a Beyoncé’ album.”