Welcome to the Boolin Tunes Staff Spotlight, a special segment on the site in which we dive deep into a classic or simply personally beloved album to shine a light on releases that we feel deserve a second glance.
“Being in the South involves confronting reality everyday,” Mathew Lee Cothan says of his heritage. “Southerners deal with the politics of life everyday. We’re poorer, we’re more maligned, and more misunderstood than others in this country.” (This fascinating discussion with Impose Magazine can be found here). Though this quote discussed his band Elvis Depressedly, this Southern Gothic-fueled vibe appears most vibrantly on solo album Judas Hung Himself In America.
The first part of a trilogy recorded during Cothran‘s attempts to stay sober, the album comes off as intensely critical:
America forever
Entwined and rotting beneath our feet
The roots of a riot
That rages and rests in peace
Steeped in guilt, shame, and angst about being American, this track serves to introduce the album’s chronically bleak mood. Cothran appears as the disgusted long-time observer, commentating the decline in real time. Released just a few months after the 2016 presidential election, he aims to capture the divisive era.
Some people have found a way out
But I have only found a way down
Oh god I don’t want to die
Drag me out of this wild life
Further establishing the album’s themes beyond the lyrics, Cothran experiments with vocal modulation in new ways. The autotune of “Let Me Know (Wild Life)” serves to further the moodiness and is arguably the album’s top track. The desperation comes through most clearly, as well as the duplicity of being both here and elsewhere concurrently. The heartbeat-like pulsing to remind that “god, I’m not ready to die,” but staying isn’t an attractive option either.
You could move a mountain
But where would it go?
Into your bloodstream
Or somewhere below?
The album’s final track, one of the self-described “political songs”, stands quietly in its scathing. Arguably a critique of America’s empire building, it asks honestly, “now what?” Eyes narrowed, mouth fixed into a frown or scowl, Cothran responds with: “the answer is no.”
Ultimately, Judas Hung Himself In America does not aim to inspire confidence. Instead, it seeks to investigate and to be unsatisfied. Mathew Lee Cothran does not appear to want, and does not receive, a happy ending.
We hope to see you next week for another retrospective from our team.