Singer-songwriter Crys Matthews is pairing new music with a pointed message on immigration and peace, releasing a double single that reinterprets two well-known protest songs for a modern audience.

The project includes a cover of “Last Night I Had the Strangest Dream,” written by Ed McCurdy, and “Citizen,” a derivative work inspired by Woody Guthrie’s “Deportee.” Together, the songs revisit themes of war, displacement and human dignity through a contemporary lens.

Matthews said “Citizen” was shaped by recent debates over immigration policy and treatment of immigrant communities in the United States.

“As this administration’s intentions toward our immigrant population became abundantly clear in the summer of 2025, I remembered thinking of Woody Guthrie’s important song ‘Deportee,’” Matthews said. “I turned it on and immediately thought, there is an entirely different conversation that would be had were he trying to write that song now because so much of the indignities being hurled at our immigrant siblings are being hurled at people who are in fact citizens of this country.”

She added, “As a proud Black southerner, the motion of again seeing this country ask to see somebody’s papers is beyond egregious. What is happening to them is an affront to their humanity. If they did absolutely nothing for this country, it would still be absolutely egregious because they are human beings and their humanity matters, point blank, period. But the fact is, our immigrant community does so very much for this country.”

Matthews said she aimed to honor Guthrie’s original intent while updating the narrative.

“And so, I sat down to just sort of rewrite Woody’s song in a way that felt like it honored his original impetus for writing ‘Deportee’ … but that still held space for the reality in which we are living. ‘Citizen’ is the result of that endeavor,” she said. “It was important to me to keep as many of Woody’s words as possible because again, that song is so very important.”

The second track draws from McCurdy’s anti-war classic, which Matthews described as enduring because of its simplicity.

“When I played ‘Last Night I Had the Strangest Dream’ for my mother, whom I affectionately refer to as ‘The Rev.,’ she had tears in her eyes. She said it felt like a prayer,” Matthews said. “I think that is what has drawn so many artists to Ed McCurdy’s song over the years.”

She added, “So many of us want peace, want an end to war – not just dreaming of it, marching for it, calling our representatives begging for it, withholding taxes in an effort to not be complicit in war, etc. I think the power of Ed’s song is in the simplicity of it: Imagine the world we could have if we just agreed to never fight again.”

The release follows Matthews signing an exclusive publishing and recording agreement with TRO Essex Music Group and its label arm, Shamus Records, placing her alongside a catalog that includes artists such as Guthrie, Pete Seeger and others.

Matthews, a Nashville-based artist known for blending folk, Americana, country and blues, has built a reputation for writing music centered on social justice themes. She is a two-time Song of the Year winner at the International Folk Music Awards and was named Artist of the Year in 2024.

Her latest release underscores a broader trend of contemporary artists revisiting traditional protest music to address current events, using familiar frameworks to engage new audiences.

For Matthews, the goal remains consistent.

She has said her work aims to amplify the voices of the unheard and shed light on the unseen, using music as a way to encourage conversation around equity, justice and shared humanity.