The best country songs are the ones that tell a story, and Reuben Brock has no shortage of stories to tell. His family moved and traveled a good bit while he was growing up, affording him the opportunity to see a great deal of the American west. Much of Reuben’s childhood was set in small towns, where he learned there was never any promise that the coming day or year would be easy, only that it would matter – and in its best moments, the beauty could take your breath away.
Reuben found echoes of his own love for this life in country music, which has long been a constant in his life. His grandmother was an ardent and unabashed fan of country music. An uncle of his in Nashville knew many of the performers at the Ryman and the Grand Ole Opry personally. Reuben first picked up the guitar at age 14; he taught himself to play within a few weeks, and it’s been rare to see him without a guitar since. Fast forward to the present: Reuben’s life kept pulling him toward Nashville, (no great surprise), the place he continues to call his home. The coronavirus lockdowns that swept the world into isolation drove Reuben to focus on what mattered most to him and to think, write, and record in recognition and in defiance of the uncertainty in the world. In 2020, Reuben Brock released My Perfect Christmas Night, an EP comprised of six original holiday season songs. This followed two previous full-length album releases, 400 Horses (2011) and TIME AND WHISKEY (2016).
Reuben Brock is now preparing to release his third full-length album, DAMAGE, in Fall 2022. The lead single “Nail and Hammer” gave some context to the album, and new single “Black Horse Through Hell” gives its own previews of the raw emotional content on DAMAGE.
About “Black Horse through Hell”
A breakup rarely sneaks up on you; it has its signals, even when we don’t want to recognize the path we’re on. Sometimes there comes a point when things have gone so wrong it starts to feel like eternal damnation itself. At some point it can become just an increasingly desperate race to escape the hell caused by the damage already inflicted and to save yourself, if possible, from any more. A cowboy at heart, Reuben Brock brings this journey to life in “Black Horse through Hell” by navigating through the smoke, flames, and debris of shattered love on a fast, black horse.
“I see my songs as moving pictures in my head,” says Reuben Brock, “so the video part just seems natural.” Reuben has a uniquely cinematographic take on his own music, valuing the performance and visuals associated with his songs to tell his stories more fully. The animated hellscapes shown in the background of his charismatic performance of “Black Horse through Hell” perfectly complement the song’s motif. The opening zoetrope effect takes viewers inside the classic motion-picture invention that creates the dark horse running; the surrounding fire provides the lighting for a darkly dynamic horse silhouette reiterated through the piece. From the start, the video holds faithfully to this vintage theming, as the artist himself appears in black and white over a series of red-tinted country backdrops. Each scene flows smoothly into the next within the established design and framework. Viewers should also keep their eyes peeled for some fun hidden features planted along the way.
