‘Broken Truth‘, is the highly political and personal new single by Tim Grimm, which is scheduled for release on April 12 2024.
‘Broken Truth‘is a powerful folk music protest song – an urgent call to action, a ballad full of heartache and frustration and an extension of Tim Grimm’s trilogy of political songs, each of which were the number one song of the year on Folk Radio in their respective years.
In 2016, Tim wrote and released the song ‘Woody’s Landlord‘. He’d read that when Woody Guthrie first moved to New York, Fred Trump was his landlord. Tim had been on the high school speech team with Mike Pence; it seemed unfathomable that Donald Trump was even on the Republican ticket – and surreal that he had Pence on board. After Trump’s unbelievable win, Tim wrote ‘Gonna Be Great‘ in 2017. Renowned cartoonist, Bill Plympton, did the video. And then, when Trump ran again, Tim wrote ‘Gone‘ in 2020, driven by his sense that America had over those four years, lost so much – through the pandemic, the loss of fellow musicians, and the Trump-driven decline in public civility and respect for America in the world. Then, Trump lost, but didn’t go away.
Tim says about ‘Broken Truth’, “We as a society should have dismissed Trump after his loss, and certainly after the January 6th storming of the Capitol. We should have arrested him, and dismantled the framework that enabled him. But we didn’t, and he’s still out there, telling outright lies and running for another term. We must speak up. We must face this deep tear in the fabric of our society, not bury our heads in the sand. We must fight back. We must not let our country descend into this dystopian madness. We need to wield the songwriting sword with a fervent intent these days. For 9 years we’ve lived with sorrow – our will has been tested and our hearts have been broken. Let’s turn the tide and wield Pete Seeger’s Hammer. Let’s make America a good place, a compassionate place which can be called a beacon for truth and hope again. I’ll be singing, loud and clear.” Tim is joined on this track by guitarist Sergio Webb and pianist Nate Borofsky.
The accompanying video for ‘Broken Truth’ will be posted on Tim’s YouTube Channel on April 10.
For most of Tim Grimm’s 25-year music career as a storytelling balladeer in the tradition of John Prine, Woody Guthrie, and Bob Dylan, he has written primarily about family, community, history, and social issues, often framed by his strong sense of place and his many years on the rural family farm he built in his home state of Indiana. He now splits his time between a cottage on the Oklahoma prairie and 50 acres of Indiana woods bought by his father in 1971.
