“There’s nothing special about me,” Oliver Anthony told followers on his Facebook page on Thursday. “I’m not a good musician, I’m not a very good person.”
It’s quite a statement from the man who unwittingly embodied the current American zeitgeist with his viral song, “Rich Men North of Richmond.”
But fame and fortune were never Anthony’s goal, and the sudden notoriety has left the singer in a “weird place.” For one, Anthony has apparently been inundated with messages from people who felt the pain in his song to their very core.
“It’s been difficult as I browse through the 50,000+ messages and emails I’ve received in the last week,” he wrote. “The stories that have been shared paint a brutally honest picture. Suicide, addiction, unemployment, anxiety and depression, hopelessness and the list goes on.”
“Im sitting in such a weird place in my life right now. I never wanted to be a full time musician, much less sit at the top of the iTunes charts,” he confessed. “Draven from RadioWv and I filmed these tunes on my land with the hope that it may hit 300k views.”
As of Saturday morning, “Rich Men North of Richmond” has been viewed on YouTube more than 24 million times.
(Video: YouTube)
“I still don’t quite believe what has went on since we uploaded that,” he said. “It’s just strange to me.”
Lucrative offers from the music industry have poured in, but Anthony has chosen to give them a pass.
“People in the music industry give me blank stares when I brush off 8 million dollar offers,” he said. “I don’t want 6 tour buses, 15 tractor trailers and a jet. I don’t want to play stadium shows, I don’t want to be in the spotlight.”
“I wrote the music I wrote because I was suffering with mental health and depression,” he explained. “These songs have connected with millions of people on such a deep level because they’re being sung by someone feeling the words in the very moment they were being sung. No editing, no agent, no bullshit. Just some idiot and his guitar. The style of music that we should have never gotten away from in the first place.”
He then went on to offer his many fans a “formal introduction” to “who I actually am.”
“My legal name is Christopher Anthony Lunsford,” he revealed. “My grandfather was Oliver Anthony, and ‘Oliver Anthony Music’ is a dedication not only to him, but 1930’s Appalachia where he was born and raised. Dirt floors, seven kids, hard times.”
He said he’s happy to be called “Oliver,” as that’s how America came to know him, but to his friends and family, he still goes by “Chris.”
“You can decide for yourself,” he told readers, “either is fine.”
Anthony continues:
In 2010, I dropped out of high school at age 17. I have a GED from Spruce Pine, NC. I worked multiple plant jobs in Western NC, my last being at the paper mill in McDowell county. I worked 3rd shift, 6 days a week for $14.50 an hour in a living hell. In 2013, I had a bad fall at work and fractured my skull. It forced me to move back home to Virginia. Due to complications from the injury, it took me 6 months or so before I could work again.
From 2014 until just a few days ago, I’ve worked outside sales in the industrial manufacturing world. My job has taken me all over Virginia and into the Carolinas, getting to know tens of thousands of other blue collar workers on job sites and in factories.
“Ive spent all day, everyday, for the last 10 years hearing the same story,” he said. “People are SO damn tired of being neglected, divided and manipulated.”
Anthony said he still owes $60,000 on the property he paid $97,500 for in 2019.
“I am living in a 27′ camper with a tarp on the roof that I got off of craigslist for $750,” he stated.
“There’s nothing special about me. I’m not a good musician, I’m not a very good person,” he said. “I’ve spent the last 5 years struggling with mental health and using alcohol to drown it.”
The current state of the world has often left him feeling “hopeless.”
“I am sad to see the world in the state it’s in, with everyone fighting with each other,” Anthony wrote. “I have spent many nights feeling hopeless, that the greatest country on Earth is quickly fading away.”
He places much of the blame for the division he sees among people on the internet.
“I HATE the way the Internet has divided all of us,” he wrote. “The Internet is a parasite, that infects the minds of humans and has their way with them. Hours wasted, goals forgotten, loved ones sitting in houses with each other distracted all day by technology made by the hands of other poor souls in sweat shops in a foreign land.”
“When is enough, enough?” he asked. “When are we going to fight for what is right again?”
“MILLIONS have died protecting the liberties we have,” Anthony noted. “Freedom of speech is such a precious gift. Never in world history has the world had the freedom it currently does. Don’t let them take it away from you.”
“Just like those once wandering in the desert, we have lost our way from God and have let false idols distract us and divide us,” he concluded. “It’s a damn shame.”
Anthony’s passionate, humble, and honest revelations have only served to embed him deeper into America’s heart.
“You are the voice that we, the blue collared American people, need,” one user on Facebook replied. “Thank you for your words… You’ve made lifelong fans here by just being you – stay true to who you are.”
“What a wonderful story. My dad just sent this to me and I truly love how down to earth and real you are,” said another. “You’re such a light to all of the people who have been sitting in darkness.”
“For such a time as this, the good Lord is giving you a platform,” said a third. “Thank you for using it for good.”
Over on X, the wave of love for Anthony continued.
“Chris, you may have just won the American Heart,” said the Daily Wire’s Bree A. Dale. “You won mine, brother…from across the seas in the Eternal City.
“We are ALL a little bit of #OliverAnthony.”
Chris, you may have just won the American Heart.
You won mine, brother…from across the seas in the Eternal City.
We are ALL a little bit of #OliverAnthony. pic.twitter.com/aiOs86LWEG
— Bree A Dail (@breeadail) August 17, 2023
Writers and editors can be contacted at [email protected] with feedback, tips, or corrections.
Melissa Fine is the former executive editor of Casino Player, Strictly Slots, and Poker
Digest magazines. She is a UCLA graduate, news junkie, and dedicated Stargate SG-
1 fan. Melissa currently lives with her dog and two cats in a tiny town in the Sierra
Nevada foothills.
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