A USMNT “Wagon Wheel” Singalong Sparks Debate Over Country Music Covers

Country music has unexpectedly become part of the soundtrack to the U.S. Men’s National Team’s World Cup run. From stadiums full of fans singing “Take Me Home, Country Roads” to country artists showing up across playlists and fan moments, the genre has found its way into one of the biggest sports conversations of the summer.

That crossover took another turn last week when a video of Weston McKennie singing “Wagon Wheel” on the USMNT team bus went viral following the team’s 2-0 win over Bosnia and Herzegovina. The clip, originally captured by Tyler Adams, showed the team celebrating a major World Cup victory, but the moment quickly turned into a country music debate on X after Darius Rucker reposted the video.

Photo by Francois Nel, Getty Images

Rucker, whose 2013 version of “Wagon Wheel” became one of the biggest country songs of the past decade, celebrated the clip with a simple show of support. While many fans enjoyed seeing the USMNT embrace the song, others used the moment to push back, reminding Rucker that “Wagon Wheel” was not originally his song.

One X user accused Rucker of acting as if he had written the track and told him to “put some respect” on Old Crow Medicine Show’s name. Rucker responded by making it clear that he has never claimed to be the song’s original writer.

“I never once said I wrote it,” Rucker wrote, adding that he often shouts out Old Crow Medicine Show when he performs the song live. He also pointed out that “Wagon Wheel” is far from the first cover to become a hit, using Chris Stapleton’s “Tennessee Whiskey” as another example.

That is where the conversation became bigger than one viral bus video.

“Wagon Wheel” has a complicated and beloved history. The song was co-written by Bob Dylan and Ketch Secor of Old Crow Medicine Show, with Dylan contributing the original chorus idea from an unfinished demo and Secor later building it into the song fans know today. Old Crow Medicine Show released their version in 2004, turning it into a modern Americana staple long before Rucker brought it to country radio.

Rucker recorded the song for his 2013 album “True Believers,” with backing vocals from Lady A. His version went on to hit No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart, win a Grammy and become a massive streaming success. In May, “Wagon Wheel” officially joined Spotify’s Billions Club after passing 1 billion streams.

The backlash around Rucker’s repost, however, speaks to a larger tension in country music: When does a cover become part of an artist’s own story?

Country music has always been built, in part, on reinterpretation. Songs get passed from artist to artist, generation to generation, and audience to audience. For example, “Tennessee Whiskey” was first recorded by David Allan Coe before George Jones made it a country standard and Chris Stapleton turned it into one of the defining songs of his career. Today, many casual listeners associate the song almost entirely with Stapleton, even though its history stretches back decades.

Luke Combs experienced a similar conversation with his cover of Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car.” His version became a massive country hit, but it also sparked discussion about race, genre, authorship and whether new audiences understood the song’s original significance. At the same time, Chapman was widely credited and later celebrated when “Fast Car” won Song of the Year at the CMA Awards.

Morgan Wallen’s “Cover Me Up” is another major example. The song was written and first released by Jason Isbell, but Wallen’s version introduced it to a massive new audience and became one of the most recognizable songs in his early catalog. 

Even newer country releases continue that tradition. Ella Langley’s recent album “Dandelion” includes a cover of Kitty Wells’ “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels,” a groundbreaking country song that helped establish Wells as one of the genre’s most important female voices.

The issue is not whether country artists should cover songs. They always have. The real debate is about credit, context and the unspoken double standard that sometimes surrounds who is expected to keep explaining a song’s origin years after their version became famous.

Rucker’s “Wagon Wheel” did not erase Old Crow Medicine Show. If anything, it brought the song to a new generation of country fans. But the reaction on X shows that fans are still sensitive about ownership, especially when a cover becomes so big that it starts to feel like the cover is the original.