Commentary

Random Thoughts of the Week: How Country Music Made me a Nicki Minaj Fan

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Now, before anyone loses respect for me due to the above statement or decides my opinions about country music are no longer valid, please understand that title for what it was. Also, understand that we all are music lovers first, before genre lines ever come into play. I say this because I have seen comments on other sites saying people who profess love and/or knowledge of other genres do not care as much about country music as those who love country exclusively. So, as ridiculous an opinion as this might be, I felt I should address it before making my main point.

Yesterday, (August 24th),
Saving Country Music
published an article containing some of the preliminary results of a study conducted by McMaster University. The university is studying the open-mindedness of music fans of specific genres to other genres. In other words, if someone listens to mostly country music, are they more or less likely to also listen to other genres? According to the study, country fans rank fourth in open-mindedness among the ten genres studied. The most interesting early finding was that rap, dance, and pop fans are the three most cloes-minded groups. In other words, people who listen to these three genres are not likely to be open to other music. Also, the study highlighted some “asymmetrical pairings” between certain genres. One such pairing was country and pop; country fans are more likely to listen to pop, but pop fans won’t share that love for country. So, those fans who become “country” fans because of Sam Hunt won’t suddenly start listening to Kacey Musgraves, but a country fan who likes Taylor Swift might then develop a taste for Katy Perry.

This explains why, in its effort to please the close-minded pop fans flooding “country” music, country has all but forsaken its roots. Heaven forbid a fifteen-year-old be subjected to the lyricism of Cam’s “Burning House” when she could learn about partying and sex from Luke Bryan’s douche masterpiece “Kick The Dust Up.” Country singers even go so far as to call actual country music boring and paint the fans as close-minded old people, all for the sake of keeping their fickle pop fan base happy.

So if we’re not making Kacey Musgraves fans out of Sam Hunt groupies, what is this wave of bad pop music actually doing? Well, this is what happened in my case. I grew up with country in the 90’s and 00’s. I liked most country and even the pop country of early Taylor Swift. By 2010, country radio was becoming one tailgating song after another. The country that I loved, which used to feature steel guitars, fiddles, and storytelling, now came with hip-hop beats, rap, and lyrics about clubbing. I didn’t know about all the country I could be listening to; all I knew was country radio. In my mind, country had died. I tried to like the bro country and pop country, but I grew more and more frustrated with it until last year, when I decided that if country was dead, I should find something else to listen to. I had listened to so much bad pop music that I welcomed good pop music. Even their club songs are better than country’s club songs. If I have to listen to that anyway, I’d certainly rather hear Nicki Minaj’s “The Night is Still Young” than Luke Bryan’s “That’s My Kind of Night.” I’ll always love country more, but when your choices are pop and worse pop with a twang, you take pop any day. During that time, I came to appreciate a considerable amount of pop music. I am extremely grateful for sites like SCM and Country Perspective that helped me find good country music again. Country music is still alive and well, and for that, I can be thankfull. Country music is still my favorite genre because it carries lyrics of substance, but as a music lover first, I am glad in a way that I was open to pop. (I guess that’s what comes from being an open-minded country fan.) I am certainly glad that is not all I have the choice of listening to though. These days, I would say I listen to about 80% country and 20% pop. I have always liked a little music from other genres as well, including rock, Christian, and r&b, but country and pop are the two I listen to on a regular basis. Having said that, I still hate most of the crap on country radio because it is bad pop and worse country.

The alarming thing is that my case seems to be more common than it should be. People argue that Sam Hunt or Taylor Swift can bring someone into country, and then this person might suddenly start liking Ashley Monroe and Alan Jackson. This sounds ridiculous on the surface, and now a study has backed it up. Also, pop fans are by definition listening to what is popular; in other words, someone who is introduced to “country” because of Sam Hunt is generally not going to go seeking Ashley Monroe and Alan Jackson. And seeking is what they’d have to do, because God forbid country radio play anything with substance. It seems far more likely, then, that someone who likes Ashley Monroe and Alan Jackson but who doesn’t hear anything except bad pop music on the local country station, would switch the station in exasperation and develop an appreciation for whatever is playing. I imagine there are a lot more people who have Ashley Monroe and Nicki Minaj in their iTunes library than those who have Ashley Monroe and Sam Hunt. Even more than that, there are those who have Sam Hunt and Nicki Minaj, because out of the three, these two are the most similar, which says a lot, (and nothing good) about the state of country music. Country fans are not being created by all this pop influence. All that is happening is that more pop fans are being created in response to the bad excuse for pop music that country continues to produce. By catering to the close-minded pop fans, country music continues to lose its identity in favor of being an inferior version of the music these close-minded fans love.

Tomatoes of the Week: Maddie & Tae

Their debut album comes out Friday, so they will be our featured females.

Random Country Suggestion: Miranda Lambert–“Roots and Wings”

Sadly, this wasn’t chosen as a single and we are stuck with “Smokin’ and Drinkin'” instead.

Non-Country Suggestion: Nicki Minaj: “All Things Go”

One of the results of me being an open-minded country fan.

Reviews

Album Review: Kip Moore–Wild Ones

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Country Rating: 5/10
Rock Rating: 7/10

This album was a hard one to review. Kip Moore is naturally more of a rocker than a country singer, and Wild Ones is much more of a rock album. Having said that, it’s a pretty good rock album. To rate it higher on a country Web site is therefore unfair; however, to not recognize the quality of the music is also a disservice. Hence, I gave this two ratings. If country singers actually put out country music, this problem doesn’t exist, but that’s not the case in 2015. Instead, we get pop and rock and r&b disguised as country, and more often than not, the music is just as bad in its real genre. This is not the case with Kip Moore, and for that, he and his album should be commended.

The album’s title track is a decent rock song about partying on the weekends “with the ones your mama said to run from, the ones your daddy kept you from.” The drums drive the beat of this song, and I can tell thought was put into the production. Also, they are not partying on some dirt road or even in a club; the location is actually not mentioned, and focus is more on the “wild ones” having fun. Next is “Come and Get It,” a song in which Kip is telling a woman to “come and get” his love. He asks her, “Girl, what’s the matter with you, can’t you see it when it’s standing right in front of you?” Again, the production is a plus, with drums rising throughout the song. In “Girl of the Summer,” Kip once again shows some originality by taking a familiar theme (missing a summer love) and giving it some life. Next is “Magic,” a love song in which he compares a woman’s love to a fairy tale. It is pretty original and the production helps it, but I could have done without this song being on the album. To me, it doesn’t add anything to Wild Ones at all, either from a country or rock perspective.

“That Was Us” has more of a pop rock feel. In this slow song, an old theme is once again introduced (reminiscing about old times with friends.) However, these characters actually have names, and a story is actually told. In the third verse, two friends are stopped by the cops on their way to kill a man who has been abusing their female friend. Next is “Lipstick,” a song about how Kip has traveled literally everywhere in the country to be with his woman and “Kiss your lipstick.” The production makes this a great rock song, but the point is lost because it is more about all the places he has been (three verses of listing places) than about coming back home to the woman. “What Ya Got on Tonight?” finds Moore on the road again, seeing many beautiful women but still missing someone at home and asking her, “what ya got on tonight?” Production is once again a plus, but not much to say about the lyrics.

Next is “Heart’s Desire,” a song with better lyrics where he knows he has messed up and lost a woman, and he wants her to understand she is his “heart’s desire.” “Complicated” also features well-written lyrics, telling the story of a love that is realistic, unlike the fairy tale in “Magic.” “It don’t always go just like you hoped it would, but sometimes complicated’s pretty damn good.” Also, this song sounds like an actual blend of country and rock. The lead single, “I’m To Blame” has grown on me somewhat, but it still feels like it’s missing something–perhaps a guitar solo. I do like the attitude in the song and the acknowledgement that there are consequences for our actions. “That’s All Right With Me” is another verse of the same song; a song where Kip makes no apologies for being country and being himself. However, I’d rather it resemble “I’m To Blame” than some of the other songs where people try (and fail) to prove their country cred. I think I would have liked this and “I’m To Blame” better if they were not back-to-back on the album. “Running For You” is a pop rock love song where Kip Moore promises to come “running for you” whenever she needs him. Finally, “Comeback Kid” paints the picture of a man struggling to rise from hard times and asking a woman to not give up on him. This song has some great lyrics, including “I’m a Hail Mary pass on homecoming night, six points down, the clock ticking by, come hell or high water, I still believe I can win, Just call me the comeback kid.” I could be wrong, but this song feels somewhat personal to Kip Moore, and that makes it one of the better songs on the album.

On the deluxe version, you will find “What I Do,” another verse of “I’m to Blame” (this one is helped by its track placement), “Backseat,” an actual good song about hooking up in a backseat because it focuses on the nerves and the girl, (again, old theme, new life), and “Burn the Whole World Down,” a song where the narrator is running away because a girl won’t commit. This song should have made the main album in my opinion because it is one of the better ones overall.

If there had been even two or three more songs with country leanings, this would have been a decent country album. This, however, is clearly a rock album. Having said that, as a rock album it’s good. The production is great for most of the album and there are some well-written songs too. Wild Ones is in the unique position of being a good non-country album to come out of mainstream Nashville. The most significant problem with it it is that it is being marketed as country.

Listen to Wild Ones

charts

Texas Music From Oklahoma: A Look at the Texas Music Chart (August 24th)

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Texas Music Chart

1. Wade Bowen–“Sun Shines on a Dreamer” (fourth week at No. 1)
2. Pat Green–“While I Was Away”
3. Josh Ward–“Highway”
4. Cody Canada and the Departed–“Easy” (up 1)
5. Granger Smith–“Back Road Song” (up 1)
6. Matt Kimbrow–“Livin’ the Good Life” (up 1)
7. Cory Morrow–“Old With You” (up 2)
8. Rich O’Toole–“Talk About the Weather” (down 4)
9. Turnpike Troubadours–“Down Here” (up 1)
10. Whiskey Myers–“Shelter From the Rain” (up 2)
11. Kyle Park–“What Goes Around Comes Around”
12. Reckless Kelly–“Real Cool Hand” (up 4)
13. Bart Crow–“Life Comes at You Fast”
14. Prophets and Outlaws–“Texas Home” (up 1)
15. Curtis Grimes–“Smile That Smile” (up 3)
16. Kevin Fowler & Deryl Dodd–“Damn This Ol’ Honky Tonk Dream” (up 7)
17. Aaron Watson–“Freight Train” (down 9)
18. JB and the Moonshine Band–“Shotgun, Rifle, and a .45” (up 2)
19. Sam Riggs–“Long Shot” (down 5)
20. Stoney LaRue–“Easy She Comes” (up 4)
21. The Statesboro Revue–“Undone” (up 7)
22. Uncle Lucius–“Don’t Own the Right” (down 1)
23. William Clark Green–“Sticks and Stones” (down 6)
24. Miles Williams–“Teasin’ Me” (up 1)
25. Mike Ryan–“Girls I Date” (up 10)
26. Aaron Einhouse–“I Could Fall”
27. Sundance Head–“Darlin’ Don’t Go” (down 5)
28. Scott Taylor Band–“By Now” (up 5)
29. Josh Grider–“You Dream I’ll Drive” (up 1)
30. Tori Martin–“Woman Up” (down 1)
31. TJ Broscof–“Phone Calls” (up 9)
32. Matt Hillyer–“If These Old Bones Could Talk” (down 13)
33. Randy Rogers & Wade Bowen–“Lady Bug” (up 16) [biggest gainer]
34. Chance Anderson Band–“245 Miles” (up 5)
35. Saints Eleven–“I Don’t” (up 1)
36. Caleb McIntire–“Ozark Mountain Stomp” (up 2)
37. Callahan Divide–“Happy” (up 7)
38. Kacey Donahue Band–“Loser” (entering top 50)
39. Adrian Johnston–“Avalanche” (down 8)
40. Judson Cole Band–“Time to Run” (down 3)
41. Mario Flores–“Beer Time” (entering top 50)
42. Dalton Domino–Jesus & Handbags” (up 5)
43. Jason James–“I’ve Been Drinkin’ More” (up 2)
44. Thom Shepherd–“Little Miss Everything” (down 3)
45. Luke Robinson–“Roses on the Radio” (down 2)
46. Jeremy Steding–“Love Love Love” (down 4)
47. Zane Williams–“She Is” (entering top 50)
48. Adam Fears–“Golden Gravel Road” (down 16) [biggest loser]
49. Cody Jinks–“Loud and Heavy” (entering top 50)
50. American Aquarium–“Losing Side of Twenty-Five” (down 2)

  • Wade Bowen remains at the top for another week
  • this is the first of the four weeks that “Sun Shines on a Dreamer” has decreased in spins
  • next week’s No. 1 prediction: “While I Was Away

Source: Texas Music Chart

Reviews

Single Review: Carrie Underwood’s “Smoke Break”

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Rating: 6.5/10

Carrie Underwood announced Thursday evening (8/20) that she will release her long-awaited fifth studio album Storyteller on October 23rd. This is her first full-length album of new music since 2012’s Blown Away. The first single off Storyteller is entitled “Smoke Break” and is quite different from recent Carrie Underwood singles.

In 2014, Carrie Underwood released Greatest Hits: Decade #1 while she took time out of her career to have a child. Singles from that album included the Christian song “Something in the Water,” as well as “Little Toy Guns,” which dealt with domestic abuse and how the parents’ words were affecting their daughter. “Smoke Break” is a much lighter song, which can be expected. After the serious issues of her previous singles, Carrie delivers an ode to the hard-working people who deal with life’s daily problems and sometimes feel like they need a smoke or drink to get through. It is not clear whether the characters discussed actually smoke and drink from time to time, or whether they simply would like to. This can be regarded as bad songwriting or good songwriting, depending on your viewpoint. I view it as good songwriting because it is ambiguous and thus more relatable. This song relates to those who do take a drink or have a “smoke break” sometimes to deal with the pressures of life, as well as to those who wish they could drink or smoke but for whatever reason (pressure from family, religion, etc), feel that it would be wrong to do so. The characters portrayed are also relatable. The woman works three jobs trying to feed her four children and struggles with being a “good wife and a good mom and a good Christian.” The man in the second verse is struggling to climb the corporate ladder and be a “good man, good son, do somethin’ good that matters.”

This song is a country rock song, and Carrie Underwood sounds more country singing it than she has in years. I do feel that perhaps she is trying to sound country on purpose, though. This song is very different from standard Carrie Underwood material, and I would have thought a title and lyrics like those of “Smoke Break” came from Miranda Lambert. Some have pointed out that part of the chorus of “Smoke Break” sounds like Lambert’s “Automatic,” a comparison that is not hard to make. However, the thing I noticed when I heard the song and before ever hearing these comments or similarities, was that Carrie seems to be trying to be more like Miranda. This song is Miranda Lambert material, and it’s no coincidence that Carrie Underwood suddenly sounds more country when she’s singing it. I think after losing at all the award shows for years, she and her team might be trying to make her into another Miranda Lambert. I am not saying I blame them, but that won’t help, because in the end, Miranda Lambert will still be a better Miranda Lambert, as “Smoke Break” proves. In the end, “Smoke Break” is fluff, similar to Miranda Lambert and Little Big Town’s “Smokin’ and Drinkin’.” I would give Lambert’s song a 5. This song is better because it is more country and the lyrics have more depth, but it’s not especially great. I hope Carrie’s album is better. I liked Carrie when she was herself, and I don’t want to see her become an inferior Miranda at the expense of her music. “Smoke Break” is not bad, but Carrie Underwood is better than this.

charts

Billboard Country Airplay and Country Albums Chart (August 29th)

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Billboard Country Airplay

1. Zac Brown Band–“Loving You Easy” (up 1)
2. Frankie Ballard–“Young and Crazy” (up 1)
3. Sam Hunt–“House Party” (up 1)
4. Dustin Lynch–“Hell of a Night” (up 1)
5. Michael Ray–“Kiss You in the Morning” (down 4)
6. Thomas Rhett–“Crash and Burn” (up 2)
7. Chris Janson–“Buy Me a Boat” (up 1)
8. Keith Urban–“John Cougar, John Deere, John 3:16” (up 3)
9. Brett Eldredge–“Lose My Mind” (up 3)
10. Kenny Chesney–“Save It for a Rainy Day” (up 3)
11. Luke Bryan–“Kick the Dust Up” (down 5)
12. Eric Church–“Like a Wrecking Ball” (up 2)
13. Maddie & Tae–“Fly” (up 2)
14. Chase Rice–“Gonna Wanna Tonight” (up 2)
15. Florida Georgia Line–“Anything Goes” (up 2)
16. Cole Swindell–“Let Me See Ya Girl” (up 2)
17. Dan + Shay–“Nothin’ Like You” (up 3)
18. Jake Owen–“Real Life” (up 1)
19. Old Dominion–“Break Up With Him” (up 2)
20. Lady Antebellum–“Long Stretch of Love” (up 2)
21. Kip Moore–“I’m To Blame” (up 2)
22. Cam–“Burning House” (up 2)
23. Luke Bryan–“Strip It Down” (entering top 30) [biggest gainer]
24. Big & Rich–“Run Away With You” (up 1)
25. Chris Young–“I’m Comin’ Over” (up 1)
26. Blake Shelton–“Gonna” (up 3)
27. Brothers Osborne–“Stay a Little Longer”
28. Parmalee–“Already Callin’ You Mine”
29. Hunter Hayes–“21” (re-entering top 30)
30. Kelsea Ballerini–“Dibs” (entering top 30)

  • new No. 1: “Loving You Easy
  • next week’s No. 1 prediction: “Young and Crazy”
  • Luke Bryan has two terrible songs in the top 30 at once
  • the top 30 takes a hit with the addition of the terrible “Strip it Down” and “Dibs” and the re-entering of “21”…no good songs entered this week
  • Brantley Gilbert’s “One Hell of an Amen” and Jason Aldean’s “Tonight Looks Good on You” fell from No. 8 and No. 9, respectively, out of the top 30
  • Tim McGraw’s “Top of the World” fell from No. 30 to No. 33

    • Billboard Top Country Albums

    1. Luke Bryan–Kill the Lights [It kills me to type this] [debut]
    2. Sam Hunt–Montevallo
    3. Jason Isbell–Something More Than Free
    4. Michael Ray–Michael Ray [debut]
    5. Zac Brown Band–Jekyll + Hyde
    6. Alan Jackson–Angels and Alcohol
    7. Eric Church–The Outsiders
    8. Little Big Town–Painkiller
    9. Jason Aldean–Old Boots, New Dirt
    10. Various Artists–Now That’s What I Call Country, Volume 8
    11. Florida Georgia Line–Anything Goes
    12. Luke Bryan–Crash My Party
    13. Brantley Gilbert–Just as I Am
    14. Kacey Musgraves–Pageant Material
    15. Zac Brown Band–Greatest Hits So Far…
    16. Chase Rice–Ignite the Night
    17. Luke Bryan–Spring Break…Checkin’ Out
    18. Willie Nelson/Merle Haggard–Django and Jimmie
    19. Blake Shelton–Bringing Back the Sunshine
    20. Tim McGraw–35 Biggest Hits
    21. Kenny Chesney–The Big Revival
    22. Ashley Monroe–The Blade
    23. Cole Swindell–Cole Swindell
    24. Miranda Lambert–Platinum
    25. Carrie Underwood–Greatest Hits: Decade #1

    • Luke Bryan’s train wreck Kill the Lights debuts at the top of the chart
    • Luke now has THREE albums on this chart….
    • Michael Ray’s self-titled debut album debuts at No. 4 (this album was actually better than I expected…far from good, but certainly not terrible)

    Source: Billboard

The Most Destructive Criticism is Indifference