Tony Cummings spoke to emcee DUSTY MARSHALL about his hard-hitting 'American Holocaust' album

Dusty Marshall

Arizona's Dusty Marshall is a rapper who's now beginning to get notice and airplay in Britain. His 2017 single "Forever You're Loved" was a Cross Rhythms radio hit and now his single "Art Of The Enemy (ftg Davis Absolute, Jordan Copas and Krystal Marshall)" is on the Cross Rhythms playlist. The latter is from Marshall's brand new album 'American Holocaust' which in every way is Marshall's most impactful, and courageous, album so far. He spoke to me about the album and the crisis currently affecting America's evangelical Church.

Tony: Your song "Art Of The Enemy" seems to be a bit of an attack on workaholics. Would you say that?

Dusty: Being a workaholic myself I would say it is. I know my overworking can take away my focus from what's important, that being my relationship with the Lord and my family. So the song is an appeal to workaholics to look and rebalance their lives and get things in order so they're not neglecting the important things.

Tony: So in all that criticism you're bringing a little bit of criticism to yourself as well.

Dusty: Absolutely. Every time I'm ministering to someone else I'm ministering to myself as well. It's easy to point the finger at others. But I know that God gives me the music that I have to minister to me as well, to remind me what's important, to remind me where I need to be focussed.

Tony: Your early music was very personal and often dealt with how God delivered you from the streets. But this new set of songs is more social/political.

Dusty: My first album, 'Beauty In The Struggle', was very intimate, testimony-driven. 'American Holocaust' still has testimony in it but it is political in the sense of we should have biblical standards for the things that we do and when we don't our culture will head in a very wrong direction. My hope is to call everyone back to the standard which is true which is God's word.

Tony: USA today has huge problems. I would say it's in crisis. Is that a fair evaluation?

Dusty: I would have to agree with that. 61 million babies murdered through abortion, gender identity crisis, the family being torn apart. All those things are foundational; the family is foundational in God's plan. When you tear down the identity of the family, you're going to have a breakdown of society and that's what I believe we are seeing in our nation. The breakdown of society is because we've departed from God and his word as being standard.

Tony: 'American Holocaust' has songs dealing specifically with abortion.

Dusty: Absolutely, yes. That's one of the main themes of the album. It's a ministry I'm very involved in. The title track of the album deals directly with the area of abortion. There's also a spoken word piece peppered throughout the project that deals with abortion apologetics.

Tony: But isn't that an issue which at least most of the conservative evangelical Church has hung on to? Wouldn't you say that still a lot of conservative evangelicals are very vocal in their opposition to abortion?

Dusty: In my country I believe there is opposition. However I think that the consistency of being outspoken about it in all areas of life is where it's kind of lacking. It almost seems as if there are certain areas in our country, certain parts of life where we won't openly speak about the Pro Life movement and there are areas in which we will. Hopefully, the songs which I've put in here will encourage conservative Christian believers to be more balanced in every area of life in taking a Pro Life stance.

Tony: It's a question of balance though often, isn't it? Take for instance the images that made TV broadcasts around the world. We saw them in the UK. You had a tiny minority of, I believe, misguided Christians holding up placards saying things like God hates gays. That must cause you some distress as well.