‘You might not know what Virginia looks like,” says Oliver Anthony to a sold-out crowd in Glasgow. “But I’m writing about home, and it’s not much different from here.” Last year the ascendant country star, real name Christopher Lunsford, became one of the few unsigned artists to reach No 1 in the US, with Rich Men North of Richmond. An everyman screed against political elites, the song is quintessentially populist: it criticises both the wealthy and welfare recipients, and has been co-opted by Republicans, to Lunsford’s dismay. Instead of revealing the politics of Lunsford – who insists he is nonpartisan – the song’s reception reveals more about the contemporary hunger to project on to popular art and mould it into a symbol.
Yet it’s easy to see why Lunsford is an ideal blank canvas. He lives off-grid in Virginia, has scant experience of playing live, and after reading a Bible verse from his phone mid-set, declares that “all the songs you hear on Spotify were recorded on this”. His songs are rootsy and muscular, with the live addition of double bass and acoustic guitar warming up the twang of his resonator guitar. Vocally he’s the real deal, his clear tone lending conviction to the plaintive Cobwebs and Cocaine and reluctant drinking song I’ve Got to Get Sober.
