Robert Adam - Governed by the Seasons
Self-Released
Released on October 3rd, 2025
Country is a genre that is the subject of much dispute. It can be as simple as contentions over music elitism downplaying the significance of the genre or as complicated as considering the extensive political implications of its genre and scene. Especially at the turn of the century, country became a genre tied to volatile right-wing ideology and American nationalism in the aftermath of 9/11 from more traditional country in Hank Williams Jr. to pop rap country in Kid Rock.
Notably, the heritage and segregation of country has become a highly contested matter from considering Hank Williams Sr.’s formative learning from Rufus “Tee-Tot” Payne, an older black man who taught him blues and performance, to more contemporary reclamations of blackness in country by the likes of D’orjay The Singing Shaman’s New Kind of Outlaw (2020) or Beyoncé’s COWBOY CARTER (2024). In this context, it is not surprising that queer angles to country have come by way of classics like k.d. lang’s Ingénue (1992), Mary Lambert’s “Same Love” (2012) (with Macklemore and Ryan Lewis) and “She Keeps Me Warm” (2013), Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road” (2018), Orville Peck’s Pony (2019), and Chappell Roan’s “The Giver” (2025).
Living as a trans woman in the prairies, the bursting phenomenon of prairie queerness has not been lost on me. In Edmonton, both k.d. Lang’s legacy, D’orjay The Singing Shaman’s music, and the nightlife gallantry of the Hoedown events put together by Salem Zurch, D’orjay Jackson, and Saint Jackson have become cornerstones of local queerness in the country for me. This context is significant for me to engage with country as a genre given my sociopolitical position, but also in light of this debut album by Robert Adam: Governed by the Seasons.
Robert Adam is a queer non-binary country artist based out of Calgary, Alberta. For close to half a decade, Adam has been involved in tours, theatre performances, and festivals while slowly teasing singles out that have ramped up to their debut with Governed by the Seasons. Adam’s music has received praise from Orville Peck, who referred to it as “Good, classic 90’s country. You can’t go wrong” on Sirius XM back in 2024. Thus, the anticipation for this release has sat heavily for an extended period of time. And unfortunately, Adam has hit headlines for being among artists like Bells Larsen and T. Thomason who all had to forgo touring the U.S. due to the violent political and institutional climate towards trans people.
Governed by the Seasons is an album that queers country through its amplification of the pageantry of rodeo aesthetics taking to the extremes of drag. Along with the aesthetic presentation, fashion, photography, and cinematography built around Adam’s work, the music learns into an ethereal emotive edge. From the get go, the album starts out with a cinematic intro with “Nova Lux Nascitur (A New Light is Born)” offering a poetic spoken word track over a glossy country composition that gives it this fantastical ambience. This thematically sets a reflective tone and grandeur to the music that Adam can make as they carry this gentle demeanor in describing the irreducible vulnerability of being human along with its persistent resilience. Moving forward, we do get a more conventional country sound which is nevertheless punctuated by the angelic quality of Adam’s singing and lyricism. The punctuation at the end of the choruses for “Angels Never Die” channels and directs all the energy from the first track in the album that picks up the pace. The strings in the single “Sweetheart” open up a loving tribute song to Adam’s mother in collaboration with their sister Heather May, as together they are available to paint a vivid image of familiarity and comfort which is evocative all around. The point at which their voices begin to weave into one another makes for a fun listening experience for those paying attention to the mixing details going into this record.
The interlude “Friends In High Places” goes back to a mix of quasi-50s and folkloric music sounds, once again offering a breathing space in the album Adam’s reflective spoken word performance which blends perfectly into this dreamy soundscape progressively fading instrumental elements in and out. This is followed by one of the most stripped down tracks with “Ain’t Just Here,” which at its base has a guitar and Adam’s voice as a variety of instrumental elements grace their way in from the most steady bass guitar to the bells, pedal lap steel guitar, theremin, and synthpads. All of this makes for one of the most engaging listens in the album from a mixing engineering perspective, as the track is dynamically shifting between building on scattered elements coming into harmony and shedding them to show off the base from where it all started. This definitely contrasts with the rock country banger that is “Honey’s Gone To Vegas.” Although this follow up track doesn’t share in the technical ambition of the preceding track, it nonetheless offers an energetic song with fun songwriting and composition which at times sound theatric with the instrumental harmonies as well as the rise and fall of its sound dynamics.
The single “Oh Jesus” offers a thoughtful protest song confronting the hypocrisy of right-wing Christian ideology that disavows the care of the meek and the weary spouse by Jesus Christ. The song is timely at a time where the very notion of empathy is dismissed as liberal emotional blackmail or a sign of weakness in the face of "might makes right” attitudes. In the lyrics like “And I am pretty sure you didn’t have blue eyes / And I am pretty sure you didn’t have blond hair,” Adam outlines the distortions of Jesus for the sake of enabling the further dispossession of already precarious lives. “Wintertime” takes us to a reflexive song featuring friend of Cups N Cakes Network, Lana Winterhalt. The song is melancholic sipping into the pathetic fallacy of the change of seasons which allows Winterhalt and Adam to blend their vocals into an emotive song which is only enhanced by the time drums in a double time kick in. And the album ends with atmospheric “Moonbeams (I’ll Go On In Love)” which features a humming vocal performance over the more fantastical narration from the intro and the interlude in a manner that ties the album together into a cohesive unity.
I will admit that personally the intro, the interlude, “Ain’t Just Here,” and “Moonbeams (I’ll Go On In Love)” are highlights of the album since they stretch the conventions and narrative angles of country music in ways that I’d love to see Robert Adam lean into in the future. To me, this comes to the verge of what hyperpop did for pop, and it makes me hope for a hypercountry sound that is yet-to-come but which feels announced in this album.
In spite of the adversity of living in a world with rampant queerphobia and transphobia, the resilience in Adam’s work shines, not just through the mix, but through their invigorated direction for their career. Coming back from a first-ever Japan tour and gliding on the heels of a CCMA nomination, Adam is one of those musicians who is ripe for a wider audience that is ready to welcome them. If you are into prairie queer aesthetics and challenging the assumptions of what country is as a genre, this album is right for you!
Album not available on Bandcamp.
