Darla McFarland has joined Dierks Bentley‘s project Hot Country Knights on their new song “Herassmeant.” Topped with a head of raven-haired curls, McFarland is belting out the tunes with the band just fine, but she isn’t who seems. The powerhouse singer is actually Lainey Wilson, who now has her own black-haired alter ego within the band.
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Taking her new persona a step further, Wilson even created fake social media accounts for Darla McFarland.
“Well y’all, guess I had to join this thing finally,” wrote McFarland on her Instagram page. “Don’t know what I’m doing but ready for y’all to see a little something something I have been working on. If y’all don’t know me, I’m Darla McFarland. Glad y’all are here.”
Formed by Bentley, who takes on the black-haired alter ego of Douglas Douglason, Hot Country Knights satire is mostly 1990s-era country music with their ’80s neon-pop, and soft rock aesthetics.
The band is rounded out by members of Bentley’s regular band and their own aliases, including guitarist Marty Ray “Rayro” Roburn, bassist Trevor Travis, drummer Monte Montgomery, Terotej “Terry” Dvoraczekynski on fiddle, and Barry Van Ricky on steel guitar.
“Garth and Trisha. Tim and Faith. Brooks and Dunn,” reads a joint post by McFarland and Hot Country Knights. “And now, Doug and Darla.”
Hot Country Knights released their debut album, The K Is Silent, in 2020, which features five songs co-written by Bentley, and other collaborations with Jim Beaver, Brett Beavers, and Jon Nite. Additionally, Terri Clark appears on the track “You Make It Hard,” along with Travis Tritt, who sings on the band’s No. 41 “hit” “Pick Her Up.”
The K is Silent gives nods to ’90s country greats like Garth Brooks‘ 1990 song “The Thunder Rolls” with the Hot Country Knights’ response song, “Then It Rained,” and their nod to the sexier Faith Hill and Tim McGraw duets with Clark on “You Make It Hard.”
“The goal was not supposed to make this a parody album,” Bentley told American Songwriter in 2020. “The fact is that this is a band that has been around 30 years and they are trying to make it and they think these songs are amazing. To have a few serious songs mixed in is what keeps the album from being too on the nose of being funny.”
Photo: Jim Wright/Courtesy of The Green Room PR
