Beyoncé – COWBOY CARTER (Album Review)

In the second act of her three-act project following her 2022 dance/house album, RENAISSANCE, Beyoncé’s album COWBOY CARTER is set to the frequency of the fictional KNTRY Radio station with each song on the album being its version of a remained Western film. From singing cowboy and Blaxploitation to Spaghetti westerns and fantasy Beyoncé weaving between personal experiences, honoring Black history, to exaggerated character building. While the first two singles of the album, 16 CARRIAGES, and TEXAS HOLD ‘EM, along with the album artwork and public speculation indicating that COWBOY CARTER would be a country album through and through, many will be surprised to realize that, while there is the country inspiration and homage paid, the album is ultimately a creative journey that is equal parts genre-bending and deliberate.

Starting with the intro song, AMERIICAN REQUIEM, Beyoncé immediately addresses the driving forces that inspired her to create this album and choose this particular sound, a departure from her entire discography. Citing in an Instagram post in March 2024, Beyoncé revealed that the creation of this album took over five years to make and was inspired by an experience she had years ago where she did not feel welcome and faced criticism when first entering the country genre. She is most likely citing back to her performance of “Daddy Lessons” at the Country Music Awards in 2016 in which she received backlash from country fans who found issues with her lack of country credit and liberal-leaning political undertones.

With this criticism, Beyoncé wanted to challenge herself and her limitations of herself to release an album that not only blended genres together but pushed the boundaries of the societal expectations placed on her within the music industry. With this intro song, Beyoncé clearly states her roots in Louisiana, her frustration with past criticism stating she sounded too country in old interviews and now facing criticism for not being country enough.

This intro perfectly establishes the intention behind her album, the motivation factor, and her feelings about it, and showcases in the production, lyrics, performance, and execution that she is not taking this on lightly and has instead taken the time to make a carefully curated listening experience.

The album then finds Beyoncé giving her rendition for the first of two covers within the album with “Blackbird”, originally written by Paul McCartney and performed by the Beatles, and later with her own re-working of Dolly Parton’s smash hit, “Jolene”. Between the two covers, Beyoncé excels above and beyond with her rendition of JOLENE as she re-works some of the lyricism of the original from the singer begging Jolene to not steal her man to Beyoncé threatening and defending her man and their life with a flourishing of attitude, confidence, and assertiveness that breathes fresh and modern air to the dated original.

With Dolly Parton herself included on the project twice, once in an interlude and a second time in the track TYRANT, Beyoncé includes an impressive roster of country superstars that give their blessing, essentially, to Beyoncé’s intentions behind this album with endorsements from Willie Nelson, Linda Martell, and Dolly Parton herself.

The incorporation of these particular country stars is intentional as Linda Martell was considered to be the first commercially successful Black Female country star in the 1970s despite facing discrimination throughout her career and Willie Nelson facing backlash for his Outlaw Country genre that protested the imposition of the Nashville sound. Beyond the classic country superstars, Beyoncé also includes features of modern artists who have leaned into the genre fusion of country inspired songs with Miley Cyrus and Post Malone who both lean into the country theme of the album.

As the album progresses, it becomes more and more evident that the project is very much to prove a creative point about creative license and expression as Beyoncé takes that time to not make a mockery of the genre or offer a cheap imitation but, instead, to make an album that truly does challenge her to infuse her style, attitude, and brand to a genre she hasn’t explored yet. With lyricism revolving around her life, grind, and work to reach the status she has obtained along with social commentary, romantic/dedicated love, and fun, nonsensical lyricism akin to the country scope, Beyoncé is most successful in her thematics when coming from a meaningful and grounded foundation such as in her song PROTECTOR featuring some vocals from her daughter, Rumi Carter. While each song is so uniquely different and pulls in sounds of Americana, Folk, Pop, Country, Trap, and Singer-Songwriter, there remains a cohesive feel to the album despite its 27-song track list with a runtime of 1 hour and 18 minutes. Listening to COWBOY CARTER from start to finish feels more like an experience than just another album, a rarity for releases of this magnitude from an industry superstar especially.

With this jam-packed album full of various styles, themes, deliveries, and twists and turns, this album isn’t going to be an easy/accessible listen for everyone BUT, this release isn’t going to be as limiting of a release as many people might expect it to be thanks to the unique, fresh, and surprising creative risks Beyoncé and her team made for the album.

COWBOY CARTER is an ambitious project and a huge risk for Beyoncé and her brand in many ways especially given that this is a stark departure from RENAISSANCE, an album met with much success that played within the scope of her discography. While not every song is outstanding or even excellent, it is not due to lack of effort or execution but down to a matter of taste and personal preference. While there are some lulls in the album, for a project of this size, there are surprisingly few and they are far in between.

Even in the face of a potentially dull moment, Beyoncé’s vocal performance which finds her singing, rapping, and even giving an opera-like performance more than saves the day as this album sees her giving her usual powerhouse performance her fans are accustomed to. While some of the features don’t mesh as well with her deliberate choices in the album, the addition of the features feels more fan-service and symbolic than practical for the most part.

Rating/Good – ‘COWBOY CARTER’ is Beyoncé’s most ambitious project to date that is full of creative risks that mostly payoff. Her fresh take on the tropes of the genre, sound, expectation vs reality, and effort makes this release one of her most iconic albums in her entire discography. While objectively, there are some lulls in the album, some songs that don’t particularly land, and a dash of being a bit try hard at times, there is more than enough good about the album to look past these shortcomings. While this album has the potential to be divisive amongst fans of Beyoncé and the genre, as time progresses and her final act in the trilogy comes out, I foresee people warming to the release and finding this album to be a classic down the line. For an album with such a creative point and yet no point at all, there is a lot or very little to take from this project that will vary from person to person depending on what they are looking for but overall, the effort, execution, and care is there start to finish.

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