It took years for my aversion to country music to fade, largely because of what I consider a traumatic car ride on the way to school with my best friend's mom when I was around 10 or 11. (Don't worry. This doesn't get weird.) The car was silent except for the faint sound of the country music station and the clicking of the turn signal. Then, “Honey I’m Home” by Shania Twain started playing. Unbeknownst to me, this song was Christine’s jam. Before I could even cover my ears, she was banging on the steering wheel and singing at the top of her lungs. Looking back now, good for her—Twain wrote a song about women working their ass off in a genre dominated by men and the male archetype. Respect. But as we pulled up to the school and Shania’s trademark twang poured out of the van, I was utterly mortified.
So, what does all this have to do with MJ Lenderman’s fourth album, Manning Fireworks? Well, everything. Lenderman is part of a new wave of singer-songwriters creating country-adjacent music. On Manning Fireworks, he writes about many of the same themes country musicians have for decades. In “She’s Leaving You,” his girl has left him; in “Bark at the Moon,” he’s broke; and in “Joker Lips,” he needs a rolling start just to get his car going.
(What’s that joke about playing a country song backwards? You get your car back, your girl back, your dog back. MJ is two for three here—maybe he’s more of a cat person.)
If you haven’t listened to the album yet (and you should), you’ll notice it doesn’t sound anything like the commercialized version of country music that dominated the ‘90s. (Sorry, Shania.) Much like how Lincoln’s Republican Party devolved, country music has drifted far from its roots. What was once a creaky, abrasive, and downright flawed genre that, in turn, mirrored human existence has become, commercialized and devoid of anything besides debauchery and patriotism. But on Manning Fireworks, MJ Lenderman’s voice cracks and squeaks, while a slightly out-of-tune violin adds to the raw emotion. It's the battered and bruised outlaw country music of the '70s, with a modern lyrical twist.
The title track, “Manning Fireworks,” starts with a riff that could be a nod to King of the Hill. Or maybe it’s just an old country riff that The Refreshments imprinted on my now 36-year-old brain as the theme song for Hank Hill and company, navigating a world where American politics have left the working class behind. The cover art even mirrors the show’s main characters. As he closes out the first verse, Lenderman captures what seems to be the common state of affairs as the United States embarks upon a presidential election: “One of these days you’ll kill a man/For asking a question you don’t understand,” he observes.
In the second verse, Lenderman seems to reference Mariah Billado’s account of Donald Trump’s presence in the women’s dressing room at the 2001 Miss USA pageant:
Some have passion
Some have purpose
You have sneakin’ backstage to hound
The girls in the circus
It seems that, in country music, there are two paths that you can take. Lenderman’s music, with all its character, warmth, and flaws, reflects human nature, contrasting sharply with the intolerance and hypocrisy often seen in the stadium country crowd. “Once a perfect little baby/Who’s now a jerk/Standing close to the pyre manning fireworks,” he sings, a line that echoes through the Capitol building on January 6th.
Like Kris Kristofferson or John Prine, Lenderman writes songs with political overtones and songs about human beings at their lowest point. Hotels filled with sad sex and holes in the drywall serve as a backdrop to stories about characters that flirt with nurses, get DUIs driving scooters, and fill their emptiness with material thing. "I've got a houseboat docked at the Himbo Dome," he sings on "Wristwatch". According to Lenderman in a June interview with The Guardian, "when you’re observing someone at their lowest, certain truths come out." That's Manning Fireworks in a nutshell. It's the truth.
Stream Manning Fireworks out now on all DSP's.
