Since its debut on Aug. 8, Anthony’s efficiency of “Rich Men North of Richmond,” shared on the YouTube channel Radiowv, has been seen greater than 17 million occasions and changed into the No. 1 music on the U.S. iTunes chart. According to Billboard, the music is now on tempo to go into the Top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100 subsequent week.
This feat is nearly unheard of for a newcomer like Anthony, an unsigned skill with none substantive following or identified trade connections. But Anthony’s ascent isn’t simply outstanding for its scale. The music, which alludes to politicians and different nefarious powers-that-be, has been boosted predominantly by means of far-right influencers and retailers, who’ve hailed “Rich Men” as a brand new working-class anthem.
But with lyrics equivalent to “I wish politicians would look out for miners, and not just minors on an island somewhere” — an obvious connection with the past due financier Jeffrey Epstein, who used to be charged with intercourse trafficking — “Rich Men” additionally nods to conspiracy theories and grievances which can be deeply rooted in far-right circles. (QAnon believers incessantly cite Epstein as evidence {that a} world cabal of elites has been trafficking kids.)
Some imagine the good fortune of the music, in particular on the heels of “The Sound of Freedom,” a box-office ruin that echoed QAnon propaganda, alerts a mainstreaming of concepts that have been as soon as fringe.
In the weeks earlier than Anthony’s viral good fortune, Jason Aldean’s “Try That in a Small Town” rocketed to the most sensible of the Billboard Hot 100 after conservatives rallied at the back of the debatable unmarried. Critics accused Aldean of advocating for vigilante violence and mentioned the tune video contained coded threats towards Black other folks.
But Anthony’s upward thrust arguably is much more notable. Aldean used to be already a longtime nation tune megastar with a big and dependable fan base. Anthony perceived to pop out of nowhere.
“Rich Men” is credited to a songwriter named Christopher Anthony Lunsford, believed to be Anthony’s criminal identify. His social media presence is fairly spare: Anthony lately joined Twitter, and his posts on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube center of attention on his tune, his land and his canines.
According to Anthony, he used to paintings in a manufacturing unit in western North Carolina however now lives “off the grid” in the Piedmont area of Virginia, on 90 acres of wooded area he hopes to transform to a farm on which he can elevate cattle. In a recent YouTube video, shared the day earlier than his viral efficiency used to be launched, Anthony mentioned he started writing songs in 2021, and considers himself “pretty dead center” in terms of politics. “It seems both sides serve the same master, and that master is not someone of any good to the people of this country,” Anthony mentioned.
The maximum revealing window into Anthony’s worldview is also a YouTube playlist he curated, “Videos that make your noggin get bigger.” The record comprises performances from Luciana Pavarotti and Hank Williams Sr., however it additionally options a number of speaking heads fashionable amongst the far-right — Jordan Peterson, Ben Shapiro, Joe Rogan — in addition to more than one clips striking ahead the conspiracy idea that Jews have been answerable for 9/11.
Mike Rothschild, a journalist and writer who covers conspiracy theories, doesn’t assume those connections are incidental:
“If you are plugged in enough to the conspiracy world to drop a reference to Epstein island into a song you’ve written, that’s not the only thing you’re consuming.” (Anthony didn’t reply to more than one requests for an interview.)
Even if the general public don’t pick out up on the reference — or skip appropriate over it — it’s vital to fanatics who harbor identical ideals, Rothschild mentioned.
“The people who do know … it’s the only thing they care about,” he mentioned.
The music has received masses of conservative fanatics north, south, east and west of Richmond.
Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) have been fast to applaud “Rich Men North of Richmond.”
“You’ve created an anthem for our times. Congratulations, Oliver!” Boebert tweeted Sunday, whilst Greene called the song “the anthem of the forgotten Americans who truly support this nation.”
Megyn Kelly discussed the song on her display with former House speaker Newt Gingrich, pronouncing the music reminded the nation of “the importance of economic issues.”
An early champion of the music used to be Jason Howerton, a right-wing journalist who co-founded Reach Digital, a conservative consulting company based totally in Texas.
Howerton, a self-described multimillionaire, perceived to recommend remaining week that he had helped Oliver produce the music, tweeting: “When I offered to cover the cost for Oliver to produce a record, I had NO idea what would transpire, nor did I know just how powerful his story was or the situation that God was inserting me into.”
When requested about his connection to Anthony this week, Howerton answered that he’s “not working with Oliver in any official capacity” and is “not really the guy to talk about country music.”
Anthony’s meteoric upward thrust has provoked its fair proportion of skepticism — and different theories. Some have accused him of being an trade plant, an artist who gifts as impartial however is secretly subsidized by means of wealthy and robust insiders. Others have speculated that “Rich Men” used to be the product of “astroturfing,” a coordinated advertising and marketing or PR marketing campaign pretending to be a grass-roots motion.
Rothschild doubts that’s the case. For one, it’s laborious to purposefully make one thing move so viral, so briefly. And if the nation tune trade did have this energy, they’d more than likely opt for any person “more marketable” than Anthony, he mentioned.
“I don’t think there needs to be some kind of scheme or a scam to make this guy popular,” he mentioned. “I think this just the right thing, at the right time, for the right group of people.”
The arc of the music’s upward thrust helps that line of pondering. Right-wing influencers briefly picked up the video throughout other social media platforms, together with Telegram and Twitter. As “Rich Men” received traction on-line, extra other folks attempted to capitalize on the music’s recognition: YouTubers posted response movies; detractors dunked on it; nation tune blogs and leisure websites wrote about it — all increasing the music’s succeed in.
But the music has an plain attraction to audiences past its right-wing speaking issues, nation tune professionals.
Protest anthems — anti-establishment missives on behalf of a forgotten, rural operating category — have an extended historical past in folks tune and nation tune, famous Ted Olson, a professor at East Tennessee University who research nation tune and Appalachia.
“Rich Men” may be simply basic sufficient in its message that many listeners are in a position to venture their lives and reviews onto it, he mentioned. Many fanatics would possibly skip over the music’s contradictions — with its lyrics that recommend for the operating guy whilst mocking “the obese milking welfare.”
“Unpacking a song involves a lot of these layers of analysis, which maybe a lot of listeners are not wanting to do,” Olson mentioned.
Don Cusic, a professor of tune trade historical past at Belmont University in Nashville, credited the music’s recognition to Anthony’s taste of making a song: straining and honest, complete of emotion and conviction. This pared-down attraction is a a ways cry from Aldean’s slick Nashville manufacturing.
Anthony’s “got a voice that just cuts through,” Cusic mentioned.
For Rothschild, the recognition of “Rich Men,” like “The Sound of Freedom” earlier than it, alerts a significant turning level for “conspiracy culture.” Not simplest is there extra acceptance of those concepts in mainstream discourse, however the far-right is gaining flooring in the international of popular culture, an international that has lengthy been ruled by means of leftist personalities and values.
Even if conspiracy theories have lengthy flourished in conservative news retailers and podcasts, this crossover second is very important, Rothschild argues.
It demonstrates the energy and affect of right-wing networks, he mentioned: “When this community puts its muscle behind — particularly marketing — something, it could be a big hit.”
It may additionally additional extend the scope of the far-right’s succeed in, into puts the place other folks will not be anticipating to listen to the ones concepts. Rothschild mentioned he believes extra persons are more likely to listen “Rich Men” or watch “Sound of Freedom” than concentrate to the overwhelming majority of conservative podcasts.
In the interim, Anthony is planning to move on excursion and unlock an album. This week, an upcoming Anthony display at a Farmville eating place offered out in simply 3 mins. The 300-person venue at the beginning had an open mic deliberate for that evening, which Anthony signed up for.
A supervisor for the eating place, Jessica Dowdy, advised the Roanoke Times that fanatics as a ways away as Ohio and New Hampshire have been coming to listen to Anthony carry out.
“One guy said he’s driving 10 hours.”