I did not suppose we would be doing one other episode a few mass taking pictures so quickly. However right here we’re.

As a neighborhood.

That is from a vigil in Nashville.

Thanks to our artists for sharing the reward of music. You’re the custodians of that particular reward.

I have been to this place, and I do not imply some sort of memorial after a mass taking pictures, however Nashville particularly. I lived there for just a few years protecting the South, and it isn’t an enormous metropolis. It is dominant industries of music and publishing could make it really feel even smaller, like everybody is aware of everybody. So when First Girl Jill Biden visited town to attend a vigil for the taking pictures victims of the Covenant College, it was an absolute given {that a} nation music artist can be there.

Will the circle be unbroken?

By and by, Lord, by and by.

That is Ketch Secor, founding member of the Grammy Award successful band Previous Crow Drugs Present. I did not even get an introduction on the vigil, however that is as a result of everybody within the crowd already is aware of who he’s, not only a well-known musician, however a member of their neighborhood and a guardian of two faculty aged children. In actual fact, the college his children attend in East Nashville, he co-founded it in 2016. It is known as the Episcopal College of Nashville.

So I am sporting two totally different hats right here when a faculty taking pictures occurs in our city. It is each as a guardian and it is as someone who’s on the opposite aspect of the decide up line as properly. When a rustic singer will get off the street, likelihood is at 8:00 within the morning on Monday after the large weekend, that man or gal is in line dropping their child off at a faculty in Nashville, Tennessee. In the case of your own home, it is totally different.

And the sky lowered within the sky.

Ketch Secor not too long ago wrote an op ed for The New York Instances that caught our consideration. It was titled Nation Music Can Lead America Out of its Obsession with Weapons. In it, he requires nation musicians to talk candidly to their audiences about gun tradition. I needed to have him on the present to speak about that op ed, like, can nation music actually assist lead the U.S. out of a gun debate? And what are the stakes for a musician within the style if they really take a stand? And what’s it wish to reside on the heart of all of it as a guardian, educator and musician in Nashville, Tennessee? That is the project. I am Audie Cornish.

The taking pictures on the Covenant College sort of prompted you to put in writing an op ed for The New York Instances. However can you are taking me again to that day a bit bit? The place had been you once you heard it occurring?

Certain it was on Monday, two weeks in the past, and it was at 10:13 within the morning. I received a textual content message from our college legal professional saying, I am so sorry, and I had no thought what was occurring. And prayer hand emoji is fascinating.

So getting an emoji like that or getting the compulsory “are you okay” that all of us begin to ship one another now when there is a taking pictures, particularly at a faculty, you are saying it it hits you in a spot of what? Panic. Worry. What? What do you’re feeling?

It is. It is all of the above. It is. It is your children. It is another person’s children. You realize, the pinnacle of faculty was murdered. The connections between our college are very current, and it is as a neighborhood member in Nashville, this surprising realization. Oh, this factor that occurs in different cities has come to our city. And it is come not simply to our city, however to our kids, to our the place that’s most sacred.

And even to your nook of that world, Proper? Prefer it did not occur at a public faculty. It did not occur at an enormous college. It occurred at primarily a small Christian major faculty. Proper. Which is what you what you based one, proper? It had connections.

Yeah. And our faculties are very totally different in that regard and serve totally different populations. Nevertheless, it you realize, we’re all the identical. We’re all each faculty, public, non-public, constitution, each stripe is within the enterprise of believing that children are our future and have to be stewarded and cherished on and guided. And, you realize, that is an actual elemental precept for me.

Can I ask, how previous are your children and do they go to the college you based?

Yeah, they do. They usually’re 9 and 11.

So did the college you based this Episcopal faculty, did it go into lockdown? Sort of what what did you you all must do in consequence?

No, the faculties adjoining to Covenant did, however the others in Nashville didn’t. And so the factor I feel that was so unhappy that first day was the message that went out saying your kids haven’t but been notified. The workers is aware of, the academics know, all people is aware of, all of the mother and father know, all people is aware of however the children. And we will speak about it tomorrow. However we needed to provide the likelihood to speak about it first. So when you can think about a decide up line, anyone who’s who’s been by means of a faculty taking pictures of their neighborhood is aware of, you realize, the decide up line that first day is filled with tears.

Proper. And for individuals who aren’t aware of how huge ups and drop offs work as of late in faculties, there’s a line proper, the place like there are sort of they’re chaperoning your child the actually to the curb and also you decide them up. There’s not identical to wandering out of the constructing the place I feel when you had been a child within the nineties is what you grew up with. Yeah, it is hand handy go off.

That is proper, Audie. You should have children.

Properly, the juxtaposition of youngsters filled with vibrant pleasure and life and oldsters filled with grief and unhappiness coming collectively. This assembly to me was very highly effective.

Which means you are standing on the curb ready to get your child. However each guardian’s face is simply drawn.

And each guardian is taking a look at each instructor and simply, you realize, holding again tears as is each instructor. However each baby continues to really feel very protected. And but everyone knows as mother and father that no baby is protected any longer as a result of this tragedy is in our yard. It is come to Nashville, it is come to us, to our children.

I assume I need to begin possibly with Wagon Wheel, as a result of if individuals go to look you up, that is likely to be the primary music they study. And also you even write about it on this op ed. Inform me a bit bit about the place you had been in your profession once you wrote this.

Certain. Properly, Wagon Wheel is my most profitable music.

Headed down South to the Land of the Pines. I am coming my strategy to North Carolina, staring up.

And it is a collaboration with Bob Dylan. I wrote it once I was about 17, going to high school up in New England in a prep faculty known as Exeter, and I used to be had simply discovered to play the banjo up there.

So rock me mama like a wagon wheel. Rock me mama, any approach you’re feeling. Hey mama rock me

You speak about the concept your greatest recognized music, Wagon Wheel, is commonly blasting out of a truck, so to talk, that has an NRA sticker. And also you point out this particularly, and I would like you to speak about why.

If you make the sort of music that I make with a fiddle and a banjo and concord singing and a specific type of songwriting, you are partaking in a neighborhood that is likely to be totally different than your personal type of background, and it isn’t. Properly, there is a practice going by proper now. That is type of proof..

I keep in mind the practice. Yeah.

The trains are at all times going by in Nashville.

Simply received to maintain it occurring the podcast. It will add a bit little bit of shade and speaks to what I am speaking about. You realize, the trains are going by. The vans have NRA stickers. You realize, once I was a child, there have been Accomplice flags all over the place. That is The South, y’all. It is totally different than the opposite components of the nation now, for higher or for worse. However it’s what it’s.

And once you’re round Nashville and you’ve got political conversations, wherever the particular person falls on the spectrum, inevitably somebody makes use of that phrase, Properly, that is The South.

Like, that is presupposed to cowl a whole lot of issues.

Yeah. And whether or not it is presupposed to be that approach or, you realize, I feel we’re in a state of appreciable development down south, however the vestiges stay, they usually’re essential to speak about on this regard, as a result of one of many vestiges is gun tradition, and it is largely thought-about just like the insurgent flag up to now, simply one thing that exists right here. Take care of it, y’all. When in truth, now we have at all times had the facility to drop the insurgent flag. There’s one vestige that has been challenged successfully.

And effected change in a method, or at the very least elevate the sort of societal stakes partaking in sure language.

Completely. And so I see the change in gun tradition is rather like one other step in direction of The South’s evolution.

To my thoughts, nation, Americana, these genres so intently align with their audiences. It’s extremely very similar to hip-hop, like individuals in hip-hop speak in regards to the tradition and their ties to the music, and the music ties to fairly actually the id of the individuals listening. And nation feels very a lot the identical approach. However in consequence, it has a whole lot of like guidelines. You realize, there is a couple traces you they individuals do not such as you to step out of. Are you able to speak about how that performs out in trendy nation?

Certain. Properly, at this time’s nation singer may not come from The South and is faculty educated. So that they are in has already modified the stereotype of who sings nation music. You realize, it is it isn’t coal miners anymore. The coal miner’s daughter like all of us love Loretta, however that is not who’s on primary proper now. In order that a part of it has modified quite a bit. However what hasn’t modified a lot are the attitudes of the viewers.

Which to be clear. The nation music viewers is also wealthier and are resolution makers and our usually managers, there’s been type of like a whole lot of analysis into many people who find themselves within the viewers, and the viewers most likely appears to be like a bit totally different than individuals anticipate as properly.

Properly, I did not know to enter this, however however I am excited that we’re, Audie, as a result of, you realize, nation music actually particularly, and to make clear, up to date nation music on the radio is an actual protected area for us to not speak about political divisiveness and never speak about issues of of substance. However as an alternative we’re all type of studying the Pulp Fiction collectively. And it is it is

Which is why it is widespread, proper? I imply, in the course of the pandemic, I heard the expansion of listening to the music or streaming possibly was up 15%. It was increased than some other style.

Folks welcome that protected area.

Journey story. It is you realize, it is very a lot tales, intergenerational household tales. That is the sort of stuff that goes primary is the music about grandpa and what a very good man he was and the way if we may very well be a bit bit extra like him, then the world can be a greater place. So this type of, you realize, hallmark sort of these beliefs which might be tossed round may not be that lifelike for at this time’s actuality of, you realize, I labored I am a part of a world economic system working two jobs. And, you realize, I am hoping my children are going to go get out of state tuition or no matter. And but we nation music actually offers in nostalgia. And that nostalgia is a an essential antidote to all the ache that one can witness within the click on of a mouse.

Proper. So how does gun. Tradition work together with that nostalgia, storytelling, since you’re saying in a approach that that is constructed into the music, too.

Johnny Money singing I Shot a Man in Reno to Watch Him Die. Hank Jr Singing about. Yeah, I might wish to spit some seashore nut in that dude’s eye and shoot him with my previous 45 as a result of a rustic boy can survive. It is a strategy to for nation music to retain authority in a altering world. And guns–

However do you hear it within the trendy music? Are there? You do not have to select any artist. However do individuals nonetheless speak about that?

No, Audie. And that is the factor. We do not speak about weapons. If we do, it is a music about I took my boy looking for the primary time. It is once more, dealing within the nostalgia. What it isn’t saying is I’ve received an AR-15 in my assortment. However the actuality is that many, many listeners do. And but it is a protected area the place they don’t seem to be confronted by the music to a altering actuality. As an alternative, they’re allowed to say, I taught my baby find out how to, you realize, I imply, once I was a child within the eighties, like I went fowl hunt with Dad, I discovered find out how to fireplace a weapon. I discovered find out how to clear a weapon. These items are essential to the ways in which gun tradition could be a optimistic, however the protected area is that we’re not speaking about what it means in at this time’s America. As an alternative, we’re just about hanging in yesterday’s.

So what’s it like for artists resembling your self to lift this difficulty?

Folks hold saying, thanks for being courageous. And I am like. You realize who’s courageous is the child that pulled the hearth alarm, you realize, within the hallway beneath gunfire in our city in a faculty, a child that was a 3rd grader. Now, that is courageous. All I am doing is simply I am a singer and I will sing in regards to the stuff that is actual. I am a author, and I will inform what I see.

I do not need to learn an excessive amount of into the zoom, however I. Are you getting emotional speaking about that?

Oh, yeah. I imply, I have been I have been crying for 2 weeks, ya’ll, prefer it’s… When this involves your city they usually bury the identical age child as yours. After which after which, like, whereas the graves are nonetheless recent, the information cycle strikes on to Stormy Daniels, and that is the fact. It is like, Good God, the place can we reside? What can we not care about children in any respect? It is simply over. So that is my approach of claiming it isn’t over and it will not be over till these deaths, these three deaths of American kids gunned down within the third grade, till they imply one thing, that is when it’s going to be over.

Extra with Ketch Secor in only a second.

You’re demanding a brand new sort of motion come out of the south. And that it partially be led by people who find themselves cultural figures as properly, not simply politicians, individuals resembling your self. Why do you suppose it might make a distinction?

Properly, I feel that Nashville stands uniquely poised to guide a response to the college taking pictures epidemic.

However why do you suppose that? Proper? We simply watched the Tennessee State Home expel two members as a result of that they had a protest associated to gun coverage. Expel, not censure, not reprimand. Attempt to kick them out. So what what to your thoughts leads you to suppose that?

Properly, Nashville, even though the state legislature is what it’s, Nashville is a really progressive metropolis. And I am not saying that Tennessee goes to cleared the path. I am saying Nashville.

Yeah, however is not that the robust half? If in all these states and it isn’t simply Tennessee, you’ve got received these blue cities, these little blue dots in a sea of purple, and by purple I imply very conservative, very pro-gun, pro-Second Modification legislatures. This appears like an uphill battle. What you are calling for.

And I do know it is value it. I do not need to as a result of everyone knows it is value it. However I would like I need to perceive why you suppose nation musicians are in any approach uniquely positioned to have this dialog.

Properly, and I need to I recognize you difficult this Audie. Very first thing I need to say is that altering segregation was an uphill battle in Tennessee. And and when Nashville within the early Nineteen Sixties, within the late Fifties stated its first foot ahead, this was the proving floor, different components of the South had been too unsafe. However individuals gathered in Nashville, a metropolis of faculties, a metropolis of progressive thought within the South to interact in nonviolent civil disobedience. That is the place John Lewis got here. That is the place the Freedom Riders first cease was.

Their trainings, proper, with James Lawson and at Vanderbilt.

All of that coaching at Fisk and Vanderbilt occurred proper right here in Nashville, Tennessee. That reveals our capacity as a as a neighborhood to exist exterior of the state. Now, identical to in that point, the state legislator stated, what are you speaking about? That is not going to occur in our state. We forged the deciding vote on on girls’s suffrage. I imply, Tennessee has been a bellwether place in these two different situations of nice significance. That is the third. That is the a part of the dying knell of the previous South, which goes to have to vary. You realize, 50 years from now I feel we will be trying again at these couple of years because the deciding time for a assault weapons ban in the USA.

Once more, I need to deliver it to the query about nation music artists, particularly mainstream ones who given what we all know in regards to the music, primary, have been socially punished for activism by what we name Music Row, by music radio, by nation music radio particularly, which nonetheless has a really sort of sturdy grip in a approach programmers do, and even current historical past. Proper. When you consider the Dixie Chicks, and so forth., their entire story is a narrative of being ostracized for his or her activism.

You realize, for a man like me, I am not beholden to too many individuals in any respect, however I am not a mainstream. I am not on the Jumbotron, you realize, I am not on the awards present with the highest ten performers of the 12 months.

Do you want these individuals for the motion you are speaking about?

They’ve a very far attain and the facility to speed up an inevitable motion to vary this for our children. And I am asking them by means of this piece and likewise nose to nose in my neighborhood, by means of conversations of textual content. You realize, I’ve reached out to so many singers up to now two weeks.

And what sort of textual content you ship.

Hey, I am simply reaching out to all my Nashville music neighborhood within the wake of the taking pictures and sharing this story that I wrote that got here out at this time in The Instances. In the event you get a sec, please have a look.

What’s been essentially the most optimistic response? What’s been essentially the most irritating one?

Probably the most irritating one is silence. I say within the op ed piece that I feel silence is complicity. I went into the studio and I and I recorded a brand new music on the topic. For the reason that taking pictures, which is barely two weeks in the past there have been so some ways to be engaged with this horrible story, and it is highly effective resolution.

I imply, the explanation why I am asking is as a result of your op ed stated one thing fairly particular, proper? That there are artists who’re drained at being on the sort of mercy of the whims of fearmongers, you stated, and that they are prepared to talk to an impressionable viewers. And since different genres, like we talked about hip hop earlier or pop, they do wade into societal points. They are often confrontational about politics. It is not like there is not a mannequin on the market. So I assume what would it not take, do you suppose, for individuals in your trade? To begin to do one thing related, which is which is, in impact, what you are calling for.

It’s starting and it is, I feel, in its infancy, however it’s already began.

And so it is about fanning the flames and constructing an enormous bonfire out of what is already crackling kindling. For instance, we have got a profit live performance right here in Nashville that helps Covenant College. And once you have a look at the the roster, who’s on the marquee, it isn’t the standard Americana people who at all times say, you realize, we stand with children, we arise in opposition to gun violence. As an alternative, it is primary chart toppers. They’re there. They’ve put their hat into the ring.

However is it as a result of it is is it going to be a protected area from politics? If it is a second of a memorial, is that what makes it okay for an enormous artist to be there? Proper. As a result of no person’s going to stand up and say we must always have gun management.

There’s nothing however up right here as a result of we now we have began on the very baseline the place music popping out of Nashville on the radio says nothing about violence in opposition to kids in our faculties or about the necessity to rethink the sorts of weaponry that’s related to the Second Modification. Kelsea Ballerini talked about it on an award present. These are the sorts of issues that when someone takes one step and the motion can shortly observe it, then the subsequent step is not as laborious to make. And what I am asking for is that subsequent step. You realize, I’ve gotten a whole lot of suggestions from my viewers. And like I say in an op ed piece, you realize, I see the NRA sticker on the again of lot of vans blaring in my tunes. So, you realize, and we’re out on the street with Hank Jr. this summer season. So, I imply, I am I am used to enjoying to an viewers that’s our nation folks. However I like my nation folks viewers. And I and I would like to have the ability to be actual with them. I can transfer freely in each of the areas that the 2 huge silos within the nation. Like, I’d go to work in a single silo and are available house and the opposite one. And I am good with that as a result of I like these individuals.

What’s your message to these artists who’re simply nonetheless very reluctant?

Nation music has an ideal future in these instances to swing out previous the fences which have corralled it in so tightly. That I consider on this style. And I consider that it has the facility to hold that fact. You realize, it is very a lot rooted in a gospel custom of of the lamentation, the calling out to the nice spirits. Assist us, Lord. We’re simply your kids. We do not know shit. We’re we’re dying down right here. Assist!

Are you able to speak in regards to the music that you’ve got written out of this second?

New materials? You realize, typically, identical to I am in a songwriting temper right here, I am in a a second in time with a whole lot of totally different alternatives as a author to interact on this, whether or not it is, you realize, writing the fitting caption for {a photograph} on Instagram or writing an op ed piece for The New York Instances or being on this podcast with you, Audie. There’s so some ways to decide on my phrases proper now and try to have them be resonant for the ache that we’re feeling in Nashville, Tennessee and across the nation as a result of we’re simply so drained, mother and father, that our children usually are not protected of their faculties. What meaning for me as a songwriter is that I even have the prospect to put in writing new music about this and to place my cash the place my mouth is. So I received a brand new music that is popping out known as Louder Than Weapons. That is yeah, I simply recorded it two days in the past.

Give me a way of the tune or lyrics.

Properly, gosh, I really feel like I should not even introduced it up as a result of it is so…anytime you get a you realize, persons are cagey about their new stuff!

You are coping with a dude that wept by means of the entire songwriting course of. Let me sing it for you.

All proper. wakened this morning. It was Groundhog Day. I noticed the identical black veil on a crying face and a flag flying half approach. This time it was individuals I do know gunned down in a minute or so. Solely God is aware of when it’s going to cease. However ideas and prayers ain’t sufficient. Louder than weapons. Extra highly effective than bullets flying. Is the voice rising up saying it is about time to place the final nail within the coffin, put the final physique within the floor, calling on each city, shout. Louder than weapons There is a regulation on a dusty scroll.

Ketch Secor is the daddy of two children in Nashville, Tennessee. He is additionally a singer, songwriter and founding member of the band Previous Crow Drugs Present.

Now The Project is a manufacturing of CNN Audio. Our producers are Madeleine Thompson,Jennifer Lai, Lori Galarreta, Carla Javier, and Dan Bloom. Our affiliate producers are Isoke Samuel and Allison Park. Our senior producers are Matt Martinez and Haley Thomas. Dan Dzula is our technical director. Steve Lickteig is our govt producer. Particular due to Katie Hinman. I am Audie Cornish and thanks for listening.

I am the louder than weapons. oooooo. Louder than weapons. I do not need to get up on one other Groundhog Day. No, I do not need to hear one other rat a tat tat tat echoed down the hallway. Freedom’s simply one other phrase for letting each voice be heard, each coronary heart, each hand. Each city take a stand. Louder than weapons. Extra highly effective than bullets flying. Is the voice rising up, saying it is about rattling time. We put the final nail within the coffin. We put the final physique within the floor. I am calling on each city. Louder than weapons.

Sending that one out to Louisville at this time.

Ketch, thanks a lot for sharing that with us.

Yeah, we received. We received to. We received to do it, y’all.