TheQuartering [8/25/2023]
Oliver Anthony’s meteoric rise to fame in the country music world has come with increased scrutiny, this time focusing on his accent.
Last month, Anthony was an unknown country music hopeful, but thanks to an endorsement from controversial podcaster Joe Rogan, he went viral overnight with his hit song “Rich Men of Richmond.”
A video of him singing the song was uploaded to YouTube on August 7 and has received 34 million views, with more than 130,000 comments at the time of writing.
It won praise from many well-known conservatives for highlighting topics such as QAnon and Jeffrey Epstein. The song also takes aim at taxation, welfare cheats, obesity and makes reference to sex-trafficking.
Republican politician Marjorie Taylor Greene even dubbed the song, “the anthem of forgotten Americans.”
But his newfound fans may have already started to turn on the singer after comments he made during a Fox interview. Anthony described blue collar workers as “the melting pot of the world” and championed diversity saying, “that’s what makes us strong.”
“We need to learn to harness that and appreciate it and not use it as a political tool to keep everyone separate from each other,” he said, which earned the wrath of some conservatives on X, formerly known as Twitter.
Now his detractors have claimed the Farmville, Virginia, native has been faking his accent and pointed to the Fox News interview with Griff Jenkins as proof. They claimed his accent was not southern, even though his singing style would suggest otherwise.
Newsweek contacted Anthony directly by email for comment.
“So Oliver Anthony doesn’t have a Southern accent after all? Told you the guy was a plant, lol,” wrote one person on X.
Another added: “Where did Oliver Anthony’s accent go?? Also, why is he saying diversity is our strength?”