Nicklaus Robert Shoulders is an American country singer-songwriter from Fayetteville, Arkansas. After achieving local success with his punk rock band Thunderlizards in the early 2010s and playing harmonica and banjo with Shawn James and the Shapeshifters, in 2017 Shoulders began releasing country music as a solo artist. His solo work has reached a much wider audience, beginning with a performance of his original song "Rather Low" gathering considerable momentum on YouTube. Shoulders has been praised for his distinctive vocal style, which incorporates influences from early country music in the form of yodelling and whistling. In addition to his music, Nick is also an accomplished illustrator having attended Rocky Mountain College of Art and Design in Denver, CO. His artwork has been notably featured on beer cans of the Fossil Cove Brewing Company in Fayetteville, AR. He has created additional mural installations in Fayetteville at The Smoke and Barrel Tavern and The Little Bread Company. Shoulders has been outspoken in questioning the culture of modern country music: In a 2020 article for In These Times, he criticised "fake twang" – the imitation of the Southern accent by musicians who are not from the American South, considering this practice symptomatic of the close association between mainstream country music, whiteness and Conservatism in the United States. This association, he argued, failed to "acknowledge the diverse and complicated origin of these uniquely American musical forms", as well as the diversity of the rural United States as a whole, and he expressed the aspiration to help make country music "more accessible and more welcoming to people outside of the white rural experience".

 

A1 Turn on the Dark4:22A2 Rise When the Rooster Crows2:55A3 John Brown's Nightmare1:40A4 Home on the Rage4:49A5 Booger County Blues2:30A6 Lockdown Lament1:53B1 Miss the Mississippi and You3:45B2 Don't Write This Song2:22B3 Empty Yodel No 21:07B4 Loathsome Whistle1:32B5 New Dying Soldier4:12B6 Twice as Bright4:55