Adia Victoria examines the southern United States' troubled history and calls for improvements in her new single "South Gotta Change." Tambourine and electric guitar underscore her timely message.

Executive produced by T Bone Burnett, "South Gotta Change" is, Victoria says in a press release, "a prayer, an affirmation and a battle cry all at once." In the chorus, she sings, "If you're tired of walkin', let the children lead the way / 'Cause I love you, I won't leave you, won't let you slip away / Come what may, we're gonna find a way / The South gotta change ..."

"It is a promise to engage in the kind of ‘good trouble’ [late Georgia Rep. and Civil Rights Movement leader] John Lewis understood necessary to form a more perfect union," Victoria adds of the song. "No other place embodies the American experiment with the precision of the South. It is home to both unspeakable horror and unshakable faith. It is up to us, those who are blessed enough to be southern, to take up the mantle Brother Lewis left us."

Victoria is a South Carolina native who has released two albums: 2016's Beyond the Bloodhounds and 2019's Silences, which she recorded at the New York State studio belonging to the National's Aaron Dessner. "South Gotta Change" is a brand-new track, and it arrived on Friday (Aug. 28).

"This isn’t a song about hope. This is a howl for change," Victoria writes on Twitter of "South Gotta Change." In another tweet, she adds, "The South is the land I grew up in and grew up on. It troubles me, it inspires. It pushes me to ask more for myself and for my people. I'm a southern girl, through and through. and because I love it, I fight for the South [to] change."

Also in 2019, Victoria was named the Songwriters Hall of Fame's Holly Prize winner for new songwriters.

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