Seems especially fitting these days.
Ashley McBryde joined Eric Church out on his Free the Machine Tour this weekend, the next-to-last weekend of the massive tour that kicked off last September in Pittsburgh and wraps up on Saturday in Tampa.
And has he’s done with most of his openers on this tour, from Stephen Wilson Jr. and 49 Winchester to Ella Langley and Caylee Hammack, Church welcomed Ashley back out on stage during his set for a duet. But instead of doing a cover song together like he’s usually done, this time Church and McBryde ran back a song they’ve performed together before: “The Snake,” which was the leadoff track from Church’s Desperate Man album.
Written by Church along with Jeremy Spillman and Travis Meadows, “The Snake” is not a song Church performs often: In fact, it appears that the last time the song was on his setlist was back in 2019 during the Double Down Tour. But it seems fitting that he and Ashley would break this one out, for several reasons.
If you don’t remember the song, it’s an allegorical commentary on our broken political system, portraying both parties as snakes that team up to prey on the rest of us:
“Rattlesnake, copperhead
Either one of them’ll kill you dead
We stay hungry, they get fed
And don’t pass the plate around
Lie by lie, cheat by cheat
Venom in smiling teeth
They just run those forked tongues
And the whole world’s burning down”
Yeah, seems pretty fitting right now.
But Church and McBryde didn’t have to work this one up from scratch: Back in 2019, delivered a blistering performance of “The Snake” during the ACM Awards.
But surely things have gotten better in our politics since then, right? Surely the song doesn’t apply as much these days as it did 7 years ago.
Well… *gestures around at our partially shut down government dropping bombs on Iran as gas sits at nearly $4.00 a gallon*
Yeah, unfortunately it hits just as hard – if not harder – today.
@redlady_76Eric Church and Ashley McBryde “The Snake”
One thing that’s been so special about Church’s Free the Machine tour has been these incredible moments that he’s shared with his openers, from bringing out 49 Winchester to pay tribute to Charlie Daniels with “The Legend of Wooley Swamp” to the incredible duet with Ella Langley of Billy Joel’s “New York State of Mind” to his show-stopping cover of “Seven Spanish Angels” by Willie Nelson and Ray Charles that he performed with Stephen Wilson Jr. in Texas back in February.
If you’ve been to an Eric Church tour in the past, you know that one thing you can count on is that no two shows will be exactly the same. The setlist changes from one night to the next, and with so many incredible openers, Church was able to dig deep into his bag of tricks and create moments that fans will never get to see again.
And I feel like we never talk enough about Ashley McBryde and what a talent she is. In a fair and just world, she would be one of the biggest names in country music. But if nothing else, the fact that Church was able to bring her on tour gave us this incredible moment.
