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Ok Seattle....
- Thread starter Robert Biltmore Jennings
- Start date
Very true; the American dream has always been about big houses and fast/fancy cars. However, rewind ten years ago and you would see young men buying sporty cars to impress the girls. In present day, it seems as if its more popular to get a truck and put on your best "country boy" persona to try to impress the girls. On a personal note, I knew a guy from high school who was very into trying to be "hardcore"; he was very into the style, language, and actions of the popular rappers of 2009. Later on in his high school career he completely shifted to trying to emulate and embody the country stars of 2013. I think its a pretty good example of how impressionable and trendy teenagers tend to be.
Getting back to the topic of country music on the radio dial, I think that connectivity has a lot to do with the explosion of popularity. Although it varies from station to station, I generally observe that country music radio stations are pretty good about connecting with their listeners, almost as if they are a friend of the listener. Spend an hour listening to KKWF and you will observe how the hosts interact (or pretend to interact) with their listeners. Thats something that you do not see on other stations.
Some interesting facts:
1. Fewer young men today are driving (Cars - CHOP!)
2. Most young men today are tolerant of gay relationships (Girls - CHOP!)
3. Many young men work in low wage jobs and live in efficiency micro-apartments (That suburban house with a nice back yard, picket fence - CHOP!)
4. Many young men have a negative or undecided opinion about children (2.3 kids - CHOP!)
5. Many are favoring smaller pets (Golden setter - CHOP!)
This means some interesting paradigm shifts are coming to country music. The days of loading up the pickups with beer, fishing gear and girls and going to a party on the lake may give way to loading up the bike baskets with soy milk, protest signs and platonic gay friends and going to a Noam Chomsky lecture. I hope Nashville is ready....
Ha! One thing I know is that there are always exceptions to lists like yours. Country music is for those exceptions. And from what I see, there are a lot of exceptions.
It was Merle Haggard who sang in 1968, "We don't smoke marijuana in Muskogee."
Uh huh. My point is that in 1968, the media was focusing on the Woodstock generation, with hippies and long hair. Very similar to your list of what young men are interested in today. Meanwhile, country music was providing the alternative. That's how it is now. If your list is accurate, young people who aren't comfortable with that lifestyle will find a lot of common ground with the jacked up trucks and coolers filled with beer and buxom ladies in cut off jeans featured in country music. Different strokes for different folks. That's what music provides today.
My point is what may be strange now for country music may be the norm down the road. It wasn't that long ago if you told someone Kid Rock would be played on country stations, you'd be called many things. But prophet wouldn't be one of them.
No country PD ever played "Bawitaba" for the first time in 1998, jumped out of his/her chair and exclaimed "I have seen the future in country music!"
But now he's an A-list star at the CMA awards.
But there's something else my brother in-law brought up a few days ago; why are there STILL no openly gay/lesbian country artists allowed in mainstream country music? Chely Wright and k.d. lang been banished to alt-country. Steve Grand got some serious YouTube attention last year. But still no country label/radio recognition.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjiyjYCwNyY
Something tells me the final wall in music will come crashing down very soon....
It has nothing to do with being "allowed" or "banished." They made crappy music. For years the criticism was "Where are the black country stars?" Then Darius Rucker came along with great songs and a great attitude that wasn't built around his color, but his music, and it worked. Country music isn't about people flaunting their differences. It's about bringing people together. And it's working. In a world that's focused mainly about divisive political issues, country music is one place people can go to hear songs about having fun. That's what people want.
Actually, Charley Pride had Rucker beat by nearly 30 years as the first mainstream African American country star. And two of the biggest country crossover hits of 1986 ("Stuck On You", "Deep River Woman") came from Lionel Richie, who is now a dedicated country act.
And I don't think Steve Grand was 'flaunting' anything except his own amorous interest in his song. Not particularly any more shocking than you would hear Luke Bryan talking about girls.
Same with Chely Wright and k.d. lang (but they came out in interviews - not directly through their songs.) If Steve Grand were singing about a girl, it would have probably been a radio hit by now.
And divisive political issues have appeared in country music more than in any other genre this side of underground lo-fi punk. The Dixie Chicks Incident, "Keep The Change", "Courtesy of The Red White & Blue", "Don't Give Us A Reason", "Fighting Side of Me", et al.)
But the times are changing. And what we perceive as "country" is changing as well. For me, country will always be Waylon, Willie, Loretta and Patsy. For others...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DFMbLKEjaI
So the barn doors are wide open in country music for everyone else but gay people? I don't think Chely Wright's music was bad - she sold over a million albums before she came out - not too shabby in an super crowded genre as it is.
After she came out, no one remembered her name.
Interesting....
By the time she "came out," her career was over. She wrote the book because her recording career was over.
You're forgetting one thing: there is a difference between reality, and the stereotyped, idealised mythos that is sold via the mass media, whether it's movies, TV, or advertising -- or country music -- and how it appeals to the desires of people.
Probably the vast majority of country listeners since the 1970's have never set foot on a farm, unless it was a field trip in elementary school. Country music sells a sort of storybook, fantasy Americana, where people still live in rural areas and can go out and party in the woods on weekends. It sells an image. I doubt that image would ever include anything like Noam Chomsky lectures or promoting vegan lifestyles.
As for your list, even though much of it has some accuracy, it doesn't mean that the majority of young men prefer to have no car; that they prefer to work in a low wage job; and they would prefer a studio apartment over a split level ranch style house in the exurbs; or would would prefer a chihuahua over a different breed of dog. There's a difference between what they have, and what they may actually want. I think a lot of what is 'sold' via the themes in country music appeals to what the country fans want.
There may come a day where there is an openly gay performer selling big with songs about gay relationships. It's happened in pop, I suppose it could happen in country music also.
I agree. The subject matter of country music is here to stay. There were a lot of "fun" country songs in the 1990's, but at the same time, there were countless, traditional sounding country songs. I can honestly call myself a fan of classic country from the 1950's through the 1990's. Modern country is a different ballgame. The songs serve as "redneck glorification". They're not songs about life, but rather the life that country music listeners WANT to live.
Being a city boy, I have no problem identifying with a classic country song about life. However, I do not, in any way, shape, or form, identify with the glorification of living a fake, country lifestyle.
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