Welcome ladies and gentlemen to the 2017 installment of Saving Country Music’s Grammy Awards LIVE blog. It promises to be an interesting year with one of SCM’s own homegrown artists in Sturgill Simpson up for two of the biggest awards on the night (Best Country Album, and Album of the Year), as well as plenty of opportunity for snark and commentary.
Sturgill Simpson is up for two major awards, and will also have one of only eight solo performance slots on the entire night. He will perform backed up by the famous horn section The Dap-Kings. Sturgill has to be considered the front runner for Best Country Album since he is also up for the all-genre Album of the Year, but nothing is assured.
Dammit, can’t we do anything in American without someone wanting to inject their political vitriol into it and make a moment of unification into a vehicle for polarization? God blessed, we’re inundated with political acrimony 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and in every sector of American life. You can’t get away from it.
You better be damn sure of your rationale when you veer so incredibly off the page believing there’s better opportunities out there. Because if you leave behind everything you were before, you’re going to leave behind all those people who followed you there, and they will turn their backs on you just like you did them.
“I really don’t even know what current country music is anymore. I am as flabbergasted as anyone and have no idea what is country and what is not anymore. I am not a fan of country today. Today’s country can’t be differentiated between pop, and you can’t tell them apart. If you are going to be in the country category and call yourself a country artist, then stick with it.”
“When there is music, nobody thinks of fighting. That’s why I came to the United States—not only to study country music in its homeland, but also to travel to the country which had been introduced to me by the media in Iran as ‘the enemy’ and ‘the great Satan’ and see the people, talk to them, and learn about their culture through them.”
Belief that celebrity somehow elevates one’s political opinions is exactly how Donald J. Trump got elected President of the United States. You can’t just call for the political activation of the artists of country music, and expect for only the ones that are opposed to Donald Trump to speak up.
So here we are, having spent nearly a decade climbing up the face of a mountain we thought we may never reach the apex of, and what is one of the last obstacles we’re facing? The small, but very vocal minority of independent and underground fans that seem to resent this newfound success for the top level of independent acts.
I remember saying it myself when the Carolina Chocolate Drops first came on the scene. Excellent band, and great to see some diversity represented in country and Americana music in a way that illustrates the role African American’s played in creating roots music. But there was something a bit off about watching a black band playing for a distinctly white audience.
Once again in 2016, the current mainstream artist leading the pack of delinquent members is Blake Shelton who couldn’t find the time to make even one appearance in 2016 at the Grand Ole Opry, let alone the 10 or so appearances current members are expected to make. Country fans shouldn’t be surprised by this; it’s pretty much par for the course…
This is a pretty significant sales spike for A Sailor’s Guide, which has become a matter of great intrigue by the public after it shocked the world by getting nominated for the Grammy Awards’ Album of the Year. But what’s even more surprising is how the performance of Sturgill’s other records has been boosted by the SNL appearance.
And though we’re a good half decade from when Toby Keith was still relevant in the country mainstream, and a healthy 15 years removed from when he was telling would-be terrorists where he rudely wanted to ensconce his manly footwear, Toby Keith still has a reserved seat at the very top of these “highest paid” lists, despite not showing a Top 5 single since 2011.
The fact that the Grammy committee considered turning down ‘A Sailor’s Guide’ for Best Country Album shows how stringent the litmus test is for these country categories. This is important because of the controversy that erupted after it was revealed that Beyoncé’s song “Daddy Lessons” was turned down by the same committee for not being country enough.
The checkered past of David Allan Coe often has country fans pontificating on if he’ll ever make it into the Country Music Hall of Fame. Though many Hall of Fame experts believe he’s a long shot, one Hall of Famer thinks he belongs. Loretta Lynn, speaking to Broadway on The Electric Barnyard recently, and asked if Coe should be in the Hall, answered…
Call it cautious or guarded optimism, but after the abomination that was the 2016 Houston Rodeo musical lineup led by folks such as Luke Bryan, Pitbull, and Florida Georgia Line, and where only one artist with Texas ties and only one female performer were booked (and both were Miranda Lambert), they couldn’t go any lower, that’s for sure.
Folks like Sturgill Simpson, Chris Stapleton, and Jason Isbell were not overnight sensations. It took years of effort and these artists reaching their mid 30’s before it all came together for them. And if you put your ear to the ground, you get the sense that a similarly shaped groundswell is building beneath Cody Jinks at the moment.
As the most storied institution in country, the direction of the Grand Ole Opry is always a hot topic, especially among traditional country fans. And many were unhappy with how the Opry functioned under the Pete Fisher regime. Of course the biggest question for Grand Ole Opry fans is who will be Pete Fisher’s replacement, and what direction will the new leadership take the institution?
Country music is not just a commodity or even a form artistic expression. It is an integral part of people’s lives and has been the foundation for their cultural identities for generations. It’s what binds them to their homes and ancestry, and is interwoven into the very fabric of who they are as people.
The misplaced political anger that has sent entertainment media scurrying to find anyone they can tie to the “alt-right” and then character assassinate for the benefit of their web traffic has claimed yet another victim in the music realm. This time it is Philip Anschutz, the billionaire owner of AEG Live—the second-largest concert promoter in the United States.
Ruth Musick, the mother of country music legend Alan Jackson, and known affectionately by Alan Jackson fans as “Mama Ruth,” passed away Saturday (1-7-17) at her home in Newnan, Georgia—the same town where Alan Jackson was born. Mama Ruth was 86-years-old.
The controversy stems from Carrie Underwood performing at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta on January 2nd at the evangelical “Passion” conference. The song she performed was her uplifting, critically-acclaimed, faith-based song “Something in the Water” that reached #1 on both the Hot Country Songs and Hot Christian Songs charts in 2014.
This year many of the artists, labels, managers, fans, and even many of the individuals involved in the Grammy nomination process are feeling let down like many years, and are scratching their heads on how certain efforts got overlooked, while others got pushed to the forefront.
Famous director Terrence Malick is getting set to release a new movie on March 17th (when Austin’s SXSW is raging) called Song To Song starring Ryan Gosling and Natalie Portman. The movie is centered around the Austin music scene, with a heavy musical component to the film. Many big-time music names appear in the movie, but none from Austin.
“When you watch country players, a lot of times they’re metal players that couldn’t get a gig so they settled for country,” Mustaine says. “Every single [country] band that I’ve met, any of the guitar players are like, ‘Oh man, I’m a huge fan of yours!’ It’s like, ‘What?’ Some of the performers too, they’re big fans, they love metal music.”