F You Bitch: The Story Of Wheeler Walker JR.’s Crazy Country Hit

by: Unkle F777 (from the pages of THC zine v.01)

In 2016, country hotshot Wheeler Walker Jr. hit two uncommonly linked categories for “Best of” album charts: Billboard Top Country Albums and Billboard Top Comedy Albums. Walker Jr. somehow bridged them together with his first album titled “Redneck Shit”, released on CD and vinyl by Pepper Hill Records.

It’s 11 songs were done in the F You style of outlaw country and offensive comedy. They rocked hard enough to hit and be included in the US Billboard 200 (#127), and was banned by many national retailers, such as WalMart. Walker Jr.’s authentic songwriting, catchy riffs, and offensive funny lyrics grabbed everyone (by the balls).

These features made it even more notorious by the time the song launched into national overdrive and a few more times in the charts. The sad but funny tirade of a breakup had many relating to the rage and bitterness, but rooted in the outlaw country attitude.

Snoop Dogg’s shoutout reel made it even more known in 2018. Then it waved again in the pandemic era when it reached other countries, and at the same time many breakups happened during the COVID Golden Years.

Wheeler used anticorporate, anti-major label promotion tactics, such as and notably on PornHub, by releasing the first single/promo for “Drop Em Out” on the global pornographic website.

The song took a life of its own, along with a number of bonafide outlaw country comedy tunes with rock n’ roll, country, and some southern rockin’ together. With the song coming from an actual breakup from an ex, Walker pulled no punches on what he wanted to say, including about her dog, yet with stoner chill demeanor.

Wheeler knew he had the goods on this debut record, and used underground channels to promote the album. He F’d off the corporate and mainstream methods and also released the album on CD and vinyl, without any major promotional campaigns. It’s this underground grassroots strategy that exposed his work to network-wide viral linkage around the internet, helping the album catch on in outlaw and underground country, plus some mainstream backdoor entries.

Walker Jr. might have suffered a bad breakup, but he had huge piles of cash to wallow in to get over it, along with a killer career in outlaw country/rock, so he still won in the end.

^ Walker Jr. plays “F You Bitch” at the legendary Paste Studio NYC (3rd song), where he also explains a bit on the story of the song.