Country music wouldn’t exist without Black artists. Unfortunately, the genre has historically marginalized people of color. Now the landscape is starting to shift. Recently, Darius Rucker praised Beyoncé in particular for helping the genre ” look more like America.” Sadly, the stigma of “rebel flags and racism” still lingers even in 2024—as The War and Treaty recently found out the hard way.
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[RELATED: Darius Rucker Shares His Truth in New Memoir ‘Life’s Too Short’]
“It’s Not Fair:” The War and Treaty’s Michael Trotter Speaks Out
The War and Treaty—which consists of husband and wife Michael Trotter Jr. and Tanya Trotter—have been “slinging country gospel” since 2016. In 2023, the “Have You a Heart” singers became the first Black duo to snag both CMA and ACM nominations in the Duo of the Year categories.
Last week, however, the GRAMMY nominees arrived in Austin, Texas for the Coca-Cola Sips & Sounds Music Festival to find a cotton plant in their dressing room. On Wednesday (July 3), Michael Trotter Jr. posted a video showing the plant to his Instagram Stories.
“And we all know what that means,” Michael told The Hollywood Reporter. “We all know what that represents in this country to people that look like us.”
Michael is a U.S. Army veteran, which he said further compounded the insult. The Southern soul singer was deployed to Iraq as part of the 16th Infantry, 2nd Brigade, 1st Armored Division. During that time, his unit was encamped in one of Saddam Hussein’s private palaces.
“I’m wounded for that service,” Michael told The Hollywood Reporter. “I’m very vocal about my wounds and my scars, and I felt betrayed.”
He continued: “It’s not fair. It’s something that white artists don’t have to worry about at all. … It just happens to come through the bowels of this genre. So, I feel that it’s not enough for us to talk about it, we have to demand that we be about it.”
Tanya Trotter: “It’s Now a Safety Issue”
This brush with racism was especially sobering for Tanya Trotter, as the granddaughter of a sharecropper.
“I didn’t want to sit in there and educate because it’s not my position to educate anybody on what cotton is and what it represents in this country. It just shouldn’t happen,” the War and Treaty singer said. “Beyond it just being about racism, it’s broader now. It’s now a safety issue because we have to feel safe coming to these festivals.”
Featured image by Terry Wyatt/WireImage
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