In the wake of yet another mass shooting, this time at The Covenant School in Nashville, Ketch Secor, lead singer of the popular country-bluegrass band Old Crow Medicine Show, decided it was time to speak out on gun reform. He wrote an op-ed in the New York Times entitled, “Country Music Can Lead America Out of Its Obsession with Guns.” It caught the attention of Ketch’s friend, David Greene, former NPR reporter and host of KCRW’s “Left, Right & Center,” and the two set out to kickstart an open dialog about gun rights and gun violence in America. Film director Doug Pray followed Ketch and David as the band toured rural and urban communities, creating the documentary LOUDER THAN GUNS named after a song Ketch wrote for the victims of the Covenant shooting.

Known for their signature song “Wagon Wheel,” Old Crow Medicine Show attracts a wide demographic of music fans, stretching to the furthest ends of today’s culture wars. People in the front row of their concerts might not agree on anything besides the music they love, providing this film with one of modern America’s rarest opportunities: the chance to engage with one another respectfully, despite our dierences.

Smashing stereotypes, LOUDER THAN GUNS brings together the frustrations and hopes of citizens who are asked to listen to one another and try to find common ground. Led by Ketch and David, these emotional and inspiring discussions, in barbeque joints, barbershops, church pews, gunstores, and concert halls, prove that localized, community-led discourse has the power to move the needle on gun reform in ways that today’s polarized media and politicians rarely achieve. Because most people in this country— gun owners and non-gun owners alike— want safer communities. 

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