Summer Spotlight: County Highway Comes to Grimey’s
The months after the pandemic may not have seemed like the best time to start a print newspaper modeled after the 20-page broadsides of the 19th century. But two years after David Samuels and Walter Kirn founded County Highway, it has become America’s fastest growing print publication with an annual circulation of more than 150,000. Now, in the middle of a busy summer that has seen “America’s Only Newspaper” launch its second book publishing imprint and embark on a nationwide roadshow, members of the County Highway crew are prepping for their stop in Nashville Wednesday afternoon at Grimey’s.
Though Samuels and managing editor Ryan Baesemann envisioned the County Highway Roadshow shortly after launch, this summer provided the perfect opportunity. With the paper’s July/August issue hitting newsstands shortly after the debut of imprint Panamerica’s first book – Lee Clay Johnson’s novel Bloodline – earlier this month, there was no better time to showcase the outlet for those of us in the Flyover States the publication so rigorously defends.
“It’s been a great ride so far, lots of folks showing up to meet our writers and editors, hear us read from our newspaper and this first title, and to buy a limited edition tour t-shirt,” Baesemann said of the tour. “That’s right, we’re selling shirts for gas money, like a proper punk band.”
While County Highway does exude a Ramones-meets-Hank, Sr. ethos (and not just because its music section should be the envy of its faltering legacy competitors), it’s also a haven for the heirs apparent to the new journalism of the 70s pioneered by the likes of Tom Wolfe and Hunter S. Thompson.
Kirn and Samuels make their gonzo torchbearer status clear in the paper’s founding document: “What we share in common is a revulsion at the smugness, sterility, and shitty aesthetics of the culture being forced upon us by monopoly tech platforms and corporate media, and a desire to make something better.”
In his capacity as fiction editor of the newspaper and the personality at the helm of Panamerica, famed man of letters and “literary Brat Packer” Gary Fisketjon aims to will Samuels and Kirn’s vision fully into being. After decades as the VP of Knopf and a legendary stint as the editor of fiction giants from Bret Easton Easton Ellis and Donna Tartt to Haruki Murakami and Cormac McCarthy, Fisketjon is dedicated to restoring the full spectrum of American lit’s greatness by focusing on the country’s nooks and crannies.
At Grimey’s, Fisketjon and County Highway publisher Donald Rosenfeld will sit down for a conversation with Johnson about Bloodline, a darkly comic Tennessee-set novel about an errant mill owner and the perils of smalltown politics. After a book signing, Johnson will join Tyler-James Kelly and play a half-hour set of covers like Doc Watson's “Deep River Blues,” and Merle Haggard's “Ramblin' Fever,” as well as some originals from Kelly's debut album, Dream River. The band includes Nashville regulars like drummer Jerry Pentecost and bassist Lee Clay (plus Lee Clay’s dad on banjo).
Given that Johnson is a Nashville native and that Grimey’s was an early stocker of County Highway, Baesemann has been especially looking forward to the tour’s time in Music City, “Lee is actually assembling his band for a one-night-only set of music in addition to reading from his novel, which was uniquely appropriate for the Nashville stop,” he said. “This will be a special stop, one that’ll surely be a fun event for everyone to attend.”
County Highway’s time in Nashville kicks off Wednesday at 4 p.m. at Grimey’s (1060 E Trinity Ln). Copies of Bloodline and the paper’s latest issue will be available. Admission is free.