One likely reason we’re seeing an explosion of product naming and perfumes is because in the new reality of the music business, the album and single cycle is elongating. Tim McGraw and his label Curb Records have been at the center of this trend, with McGraw insisting they release his music, and Curb attempting to stretch its artists’ albums out.
Can we just be thankful that for once there’s a female pop star that actually respects herself, and return that respect back lest our morbid obsession with her celebrity eventually ruins her? Turn TMZ off and find something better to do. Spend time with your kids, paint a picture, write a song, fix that toilet that’s been leaking for weeks. Christ.
The leader of Th’ Legendary Shack Shakers recently extruded a new musical tentacle into the creative world in the form of The Dirt Daubers, an old-time mountain string band of sorts that he fronts with his lovely wife Jessica. But with a series of slight disturbances in what for lack of a better term we’ll call the “underground country” movement recently, I asked JD Wilkes for his counsel.
instead of looking at politics or ideological movements as realistic agents of change, we should look towards art and music, and let the lessons of artistic expressions enter our hearts. That, in my opinion, is the path to true happiness, and where we will find the true meaning of The American Dream.
If you want to find some snark and sarcasm from the 2012 Grammy Awards, you should check out the official Saving Country Live Blog from last night. Yes, Chris Brown and Nicki Minaj supplied some gag reflex moments, but there was also a lot of substance and lessons to be taken from the night’s festivities. Here are the top three things I learned.
The local musician has gone international. This has contributed to music parody, but possibly more damning it has contributed to the death of the local music scene. Back in the day to become a serious music artist, you first had to tackle your local scene, then become big regionally and go from there. That fed a music farm system.
Yeah, that’s right. I said it. I don’t care if T-Bone Burnett, or anybody else with a famous name produced your album. What I am concerned with is if it is good. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying T Bone Burnett is a bad producer. It’s just at some point hype far exceeds substance, and I think we have passed that point with the “T-Bone Burnett” name.
As the new music reality continues to take shape, where one big mono genre serves the masses and micro genres crop up to serve the rest, the shape of the way live music is delivered to people is adapting as well. House concerts have gone from a kitschy trend to a legitimate way for artists to connect with attentive fans. For the upcoming festival season of 2012, a new trend is emerging: the micro festival.
American Idol introduced Jason “Wolf” Hamlin as one of this year’s contestants on the episode that aired Sunday night. If you reacted positively to seeing Jason “Wolf” Hamlin on American Idol and said “Well hell, I kind of like this guy. I may actually watch this stupid show this year!” just understand that is exactly what the folks in Hollywood wanted you to say.
Something remarkable happened in music in 2011: sales stabilized. What the music industry is ignoring, as well as virtually everyone else in the SOPA argument, is this dramatic and unexpected stabilization of music sales. Where did it come from and why? When you dig deep into the numbers there are two answers: women and vinyl.
The official Saving Country Music stance on SOPA is that I am vaguely opposed to some elements of the legislation that may have unintended consequences. But Saving Country Music is NOT participating in the internet blackout, and I will NOT be signing any petition. These are my opinions, and that’s all they are. My suggestion is not for you to follow them, but to become informed.
Whether it is punk bands that simply interchange their electric instruments for acoustic ones, or bands that have a more traditional country sound, but overload it with “whiskey, devil, and drug” references, parody in the “punk gone country” movement has become a problem primarily by the way these artists can typecast other country punk bands, fans, and entities.
The premise appears to be to ship a bunch of yahoos from the South up to The Hamptons in New York, and have them behave like a troupe of Barnum & Baily hillbilly oddities for the bemusement of New England’s sniveling upper crust, all while middle class suburbanites sit at home and live the stereotypical corporate country life vicariously through these redneck caricatures.
This weekend, former guitarist for the Drive By Truckers and current solo artist Jason Isbell accused Dierks Bentley of ripping off his song “In A Razor Town”. This is only going to become more and more common, and much harder to sort out as every single pattern and possibility of notes and chords gets occupied by the unnecessary amount of songs, albums, and artists out there.
Alright, so we all had a good chuckle poking fun at the 6 Pop Country Archetypes, now let’s see what happens when I turn the poison pen towards the folks much more likely to frequent Saving Country Music; those folks that live on the fringes of the greater country music world.
One of the great things about the now disbanded .357 String Band from Milwaukee, WI was that it really didn’t have a frontman. However guitar player and songwriter Derek Dunn did feel like the primary spokesman throughout its 7 years, and the fulcrum that the rest of the band rotated around.
When people talk about the “manufactured” pop star, what they mean is taking a pretty face, and pushing all the right buttons to make an artist that has mass appeal at the expense of soul and creativity. It is very easy to pigeon hole Taylor into this lot. But in truth Taylor Swift’s success has nothing to do with her following all the rules. She broke all of them.
As Nashville and Nashville-based entities are erecting what will be landmarks, before taking money from Mike Curb, maybe they should take to heart the headlines that have hounded the Mike Curb name over the last few years, and ask themselves if that name is a legacy their building, their institution, or the City of Nashville wants to tie their future to.
Only 44% of campaigns are being funded, and some folks are setting them up almost as a lark, like throwing a hook into the water just to see if it bites, diluting attention and sometimes money from other projects with a more purposeful aim. I’ve put a list together of some questions I think people should ask before starting a Kickstarter campaign.
As evidenced over and over in America, the intrusion of big box stores into communities means the downfall of many small, independent businesses, and the sense of community they create. Facebook, or any large website that is able to assert ultra-dominance over what you see and how you behave online could spell doom to the microservice, specialization, and just simple charm that independent websites are able to offer.
If you’re reading these very words right now, it is very likely that at some point in your life, you went through a musical awakening. At some point, you were exposed to a piece of independent music, and it changed your life. It opened up a whole new world that you would have never known existed if it wasn’t for someone opening that door for you.
We were wrong about Taylor Swift. I was wrong about Taylor Swift. We were blinded by our prejudices. When Taylor Swift first came on to the scene, she sang cheesy teenage pop songs, and we chastised her for it, when she was doing what all the great songwriters did over the years: write what they knew about, what inspired them.
Just like how Taylor Swift’s big 2009 sweep of the awards caused a dramatic pop-oriented shift in the genre, an Aldean sweep could cause a shift to Aldean’s calling cards of checklist songs and country rap. And a win for the song “Dirt Road Anthem” would all but make the formation of the mono-genre complete.
Following this success and attention to video, many independent artists are making video a bigger priority. And not just one video, but multiple videos, “serial” video releases if you will, of both viral and more conceptualized varieties, to keep their music in the forefront of fan’s minds over a longer period than just an album’s initial release.