{"id":469865,"date":"2026-10-18T17:50:29","date_gmt":"2026-10-18T17:50:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/469865\/"},"modified":"2026-10-18T17:50:29","modified_gmt":"2026-10-18T17:50:29","slug":"fort-worths-jack-barksdale-lightens-up-on-new-ep-battleground","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/469865\/","title":{"rendered":"Fort Worth’s Jack Barksdale lightens up on new EP, \u2018Battleground\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fort Worth\u2019s Jack Barksdale<\/a> can be as grim as another Cowtown native, Townes Van Zandt<\/a>. But on his EP \u201cBattleground,\u201d out Oct. 16, the 19-year-old singer lightens up with satirical songs that recall Tom Lehrer and Randy Newman. \u201cGod Is Good\u201d is a deceptively jaunty look at divine indifference, while the equally upbeat \u201cThe Scam Song\u201d compares \u201cNigerian prince\u201d grifters with corporations seeking bailouts.<\/p>\n

He brings the same mischievous spirit to \u201cDon\u2019t Have Children, Adopt,\u201d a singalong full of philosophical tomfoolery. The EP ends with \u201cTicket Home (for Phil Ochs),\u201d saluting the late folk songwriter whose lyrics also packed a sardonic punch.<\/p>\n

Barksdale recorded \u201cBattleground\u201d at Sam Phillips Recording Service in Memphis. In August, the singer taped an episode of NPR\u2019s \u201cMountain Stage,\u201d performing \u201cThe Scam Song\u201d and four other tunes. A complete performance is expected later this month at\u00a0mountainstage.org\/podcasts<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Barksdale and Mollie Danel perform at 9 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 7, at the Pony, 314 E. Hickory St., Denton. $14; prekindle.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Fort Worth\u2019s Jack Barksdale can be as grim as another Cowtown native, Townes Van Zandt. But on his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":469866,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[116,118,117,93224,88643,88950,98969],"class_list":["post-469865","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-worth","tag-fort-worth","tag-fort-worth-headlines","tag-fort-worth-news","tag-tp-denton","tag-tp-fort-worth","tag-tp-music","tag-tp-musicians"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/469865","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=469865"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/469865\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/469866"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=469865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=469865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=469865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}