Beyoncé and a new category of “Hat Acts” are helping Cowboy Core again

The Western Revival in progress. After a decade of bro-country sounds and styles where 808s and baseball caps outnumbered steel guitars and Stetsons, country is looking to the West for a refresh. The labels work with artists like Ian Munsick, Catie Offerman and Tyler Halverson, who grew up around horses and cattle. Festivals are held on real ranches. And the stars are stepping out, from hats to boots, in freshly cut western wear. Even the songwriters who play cowboys on TV like it YellowstoneLuke Grimes is releasing a country album.

The pop world is also up. Post Malone and Lana Del Rey take country turns and Bruno Mars dresses up as a cowboy Instagram. But it's Beyoncé who's at the forefront of the movement, emphasizing the culture's core by titling her country album Act II: Cowboy Carter. “I took a deeper dive into the history of country music,” he said. “It's great to see how music can unite so many people around the world, while amplifying the voices of some of the people who have dedicated so much of their lives to educating our musical history.”

Yes, a cowboy renaissance is upon us.

According to affordable fashion brand Boohoo, #cowboy-tagged TikTok videos recently hit over a billion streams in a month, while Google searches for “cowboy hat” and “bolo tie” increased by more than 200 percent and 566 percent, respectively. hundred, respectively, per day. Beyoncé dropped “Texas Hold 'Em” and “16 Carriages.”

Halverson, a South Dakota native who makes what he says “Western Amerijuana” music., says that adopting the cowboy style is essential for the country. “Boots and a hat go a long way,” he says. “Before we even start singing, you already know a little about this person.”

Beyoncé used cowboy fashion at the Grammys to telegraph her country pivot, rocking a leather Damier skirt from Pharrell William's Western Louis Vuitton collection, a bolo tie and a crisp white Stetson.

“We noticed,” says Stetson marketing boss Tyler Thoreson. Immediately, the brand reached out to Beyoncé's stylist and began making custom hats for the singer. When he asked for a crimson hat, the craftsmen broke the brand's neutral color rule.

“We don't usually sell a red hat, but for Beyoncé, we did,” Thoreson says.

But Beyoncé, who grew up in Houston's rodeo mecca, is doing more than sparking a fashion trend with her Cowboy Carter it looks. Her platinum blonde hair, spikes, turquoise, and fringe help correct the erasure of black and brown people in country culture.

Randy Savvy, the leader of the Compton Cowboys, a California community group that introduces inner-city youth to horse culture, says the Western aesthetic is not alien to Black history, despite how it's portrayed in entertainment.

“What Americans see as cowboys, they think of John Wayne movies or the Marlboro Man, but that's only a fraction of what the culture really is,” Savvy says. Beyoncé apparently used Marlboro red font for one of her Cowboy Carter shirts.

“We as Blacks, every time we entered a space, we increased it by a degree,” says Savvy. “In country music, Beyoncé is now putting that stamp on things.”

Halverson, for one, welcomes it. “It broadens horizons,” he says, “and puts country music in front of an audience that wouldn't normally be in front of it.”

This story is part of Country's New Cowboy Era, a look at trends in country music that runs in the May print issue of Rolling Stone.