Rebel Country

The fire that Hank Williams Sr. set in the woods is still burning strong in the rip-roaring music documentary Rebel Country, directed by Francis Whately. It opens in Tennessee with a reenactment of country star Jelly Roll being led out of a bar by the cops in handcuffs. The musician is a hulking figure with face tattoos who spent nearly a decade locked up as a convict. When the cops bring him into the metro Davidson County jail, instead of throwing him in a cell, they bring him onstage in an auditorium to perform for the prisoners. Jelly Roll is very outspoken on the idea that all country music is outlaw art. He feels it is music for the outcasts, rebels, and pioneers of this country.

“…opened the gates for more black country artists…”

The film then goes into tracking the current seismic activity in the industry, starting with the explosion of Lil’ Nas X’s song “Old Town Road.” While it only charted on the country charts for one week before Billboard removed it for not being country enough, its record-breaking run marked a sea change for the genre. It opened the gates for more black country artists like Breland and Blanco Brown, who do country songs set to trap beats. The black roots of country are explored, going back to when the music labels split the market. They sold music by black artists as “race records” and then had white artists cover the same songs to sell as “hillbilly records.” This led to the mistaken perception that whites created country.

Whately then explores the fact that Hank Williams Sr. was taught his signature guitar moves by a black street musician named Rufus “Teetot” Payne. Williams’s grandson, Sam, speaks about what it was like coming out as gay in country music, as does queer country pioneer Chely Wright. Laney Wilson and Lindsay Ell speak about singing about previously forbidden topics like rape and domestic abuse. Frank Ray carries on the Latino heritage in the musical genre, as the whole cowboy concept sprang from Mexico.