Don’t Give Up The Term “Country,” Be Positive About It
Earlier this week American Songwriter posted a feature on Brandy Clark—yet another female songwriter who has seen her big break come in 2013. What’s remarkable about Brandy’s story is that she’s not a shooting starlet riding a popularity wave on some reality show success or some similar and predictable fate, she’s a 35-year-old veteran of songwriting circles who proved her worth writing songs that balanced appeal and substance until she shattered the glass ceiling and secured her spot as a solo artist. Brandy’s story offers inspiration for other aspiring songwriters and performers who don’t fit country music’s ultra-young and male-dominated mold.
When speaking to American Songwriter, Brandy said, “It is hard for me to give up on things, especially things I believe in. And I believe in country music. I always thought, ‘It’ll come back around to a more traditional country sound.’ I don’t necessarily think it’s fully swung back to that, but there are shades of that.”
Brandy speaks about two separate phenomenon that are setting the dynamic for country music in 2013 and how it’s being perceived by it’s independent and traditional fan base.
Where it once looked bleak for any positive news to come out of country music’s mainstream channels, now there’s hope. Regardless of how awful the trends of country rap and tailgate songs might be, there are little chutes of life and vitality springing through the scorched country music earth, with female songwriters like Brandy Clark being just one example.
In September Saving Country Music published 12 Reasons to be Positive About Country Music in 2013, highlighting how women are leading the way in returning both roots and substance to the genre, how artists are speaking out about the direction of country like never before, how many independent artists are finally finding their break, and how outlets like ABC’s Nashville and Letterman are letting artists get exposure to a national audience.
Since then there has been even more positive news, not limited to George Strait being named the CMA Entertainer of the Year; the first time that’s happened for a traditional country artist in a decade. The UK’s Country Music Magazine is finally bringing widespread print coverage to worthy music, and there’s been even more success stories for artists, including Brandy Clark and Texas singer songwriter Possessed by Paul James.
But Brandy’s comments also alluded to another phenomenon facing country music: give up. As hope and outlets and success stories seem to be springing up everywhere for sincere, heartfelt music, there is still a stodgy contingent of country fans and artists unwilling to acknowledge or participate in what could be a potential turning of the tide for the genre, however small that turnaround might be. They’ve taken their ball and gone home, swearing off anything successful as simply an illusionist tool of the industry, refusing to be counted in the groundswell of fans demanding change in the country format, selling their opportunity both to be a part of the rebirth process, and to find the joy in the positivity of what is transpiring.
These fans will tell you George Strait is pop country, and his win is irrelevant because it was simply a parting gift, and next year Entertainer of the Year will go back to Blake Shelton. All of that might be true, but it doesn’t mean that the George Strait win, or any of the other positive signs in country music don’t speak to a greater awakening and renewed desire for substance in the country realm.
How can we expect to influence the fate of country music when we eliminate ourselves from the process, and are so bitter that we almost get enraged at the positive signs out of spite, or dispel them as marketing? As much as certain issues facing country music call for a hardline stance, others call for pragmatism and engagement. This is my concern for certain movements like Dale Watson’s Ameripolitan, or the new Outlaw Music Hall of Fame and their parallel Outlaw Music Association that wants to be set up as a counter to the CMA. As much as I appreciate their support of artists, their separatist ideology is alarming.
Handing over the term “country” to the enemy speaks to a deeper hopelessness. It’s also what the people that only want to use the term “country” for marketing ultimately want—a clear, unobstructed path. The whole business of genre building always seems to fall back on a narrow perspective based on “scene,” and this is what we have seen from the Americana Music Association and others. “Country” is the only term that has ever been able to unite roots music en masse under a big tent. Creating new ways to support worthy artists should always be fostered, and Americana, Ameripolitan, and Outlaw are helping to do that. But ultimately it is not a new term that is needed, it is the next breakout song, artist, or album that will help stem the tide and right the ship.
And that’s why we should never give up on country, the term or the music, and our plans to save it should not involve separatist ideologies that history has shown are rarely effective. We should insist that country music is for the people, and by the people, and it is us who choose it’s fate, and the type of music it describes.
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
“Damn it, the fight isn’t in Austin and it isn’t in Los Angeles. It’s right here in Nashville, right here two blocks from Music Row, and if we winand if our winning is ever going to amount to anything in the long runwe’ve got to beat them on their own turf.” Tompall Glaser
November 22, 2013 @ 1:06 pm
George Strait is performing his final tour dates, January through June 2014. I see no reason he should not be nominated for EOTY next year.
As for Brandy Clark, I heard her last week for the first time on Sirius radio. Her song immediately grabbed me, real country.
November 22, 2013 @ 2:36 pm
I would still say the chances are very slim. If he releases an album, maybe he has a slight better chance. I do believe he won it as a parting gift, but I don;t see why that should diminish our ability to be positive about it.
November 22, 2013 @ 1:51 pm
This was a much needed article. I suggest also reading the book “Don’t Get Above Your Raisin” by Bill C Malone to get an understanding of what country is and where it comes from. It’s about more than music-it’s the true American folk culture.
November 26, 2013 @ 4:52 pm
Every one should read this book.
November 22, 2013 @ 1:53 pm
I think a major problem though is that hopelessness and the constant denigration that comes from the mainstream Nashville establishment and it’s fans. How many times can one person take being mocked when they point out that ‘Dirt Road Anthem’ or ‘That’s My Kind Of Night’ aren’t really country? Because it happens a lot in the wider country music community outside of our friendly confines here and a few other places. For some people it’s just not worth the abuse so they just say ‘to hell with you’ and start doing their own thing.
Most people follow the path of least resistance and starting your own groups is easier than fighting the (Big) machine.
It can be best summed up as ‘I didn’t leave country music, country music left me.’
November 22, 2013 @ 2:50 pm
“How many times can one person take being mocked when they point out that ”˜Dirt Road Anthem”™ or ”˜That”™s My Kind Of Night”™ aren”™t really country? Because it happens a lot in the wider country music community outside of our friendly confines here and a few other places.”
See, I don’t think it’s that way. I think that true country fans are so used to being the underdog and so used to losing, I don’t think they’re not recognizing that songs like “That’s My Kind Of Night” are reaching critical mass and are having to face a monster backlash. Zac Brown criticized that song by name and called out its songwriters. Kacey Musgraves, Gary Allan, Jake Owen have spoken out about those songs too (however hypocritically). I think there are millions of people, if not a majority of music consumers that are listening to what is happening to country with a quizzical look on their face, and it’s a small minority of suburban youth that are buying into it hook, line, and sinker.
“For some people it”™s just not worth the abuse so they just say ”˜to hell with you”™ and start doing their own thing.”
And I think that type of resignation is the problem. If people would start recognizing 1) There are multiple signs of hope. 2) That there’s more people that feel like they do about country music than are happy with its direction, then there would be a greater opportunity for doing something about it.
I think if you took a poll of the American population and asked them their thoughts about today’s country music, I think people would be shocked at the results, and Music Row would be scared to death and immediately reverse course.
November 22, 2013 @ 3:37 pm
See I’m just not sure that there are more that are troubled by the direction. Bryan, Aldean, FGL and the like aren’t just being pushed out there magically they are the most popular by whatever metric (radio, sales, touring) you want to use. This is really a base issue and when any movement loses their base they are in deep trouble because these are the most devoted and they will start their own new movement and that is what I think is most likely happening to country now. And this may be a good thing in the long run.
November 22, 2013 @ 5:33 pm
Music Row already does marketing studies on the country music audience. If their research were showing that today’s country music is unpopular, they would have reversed course by now.
November 22, 2013 @ 7:55 pm
Eric, what you are missing here is that the definition of who is part of the country music audience has changed significantly. Today’s country radio audience includes lots of pop country fans who would not have been considered part of the country audience 20 years ago. The industry is intentionally targeting demographics that tend to buy more music than traditional country fans. Country radio is intentionally targeting demographics such as suburban soccer moms who might be more desirable to advertisers. My point is that the audience that the industry is optimizing the music for is not really a country music audience any more.
November 22, 2013 @ 11:29 pm
I can understand the soccer mom argument if the topic were country music circa 2010. However, how would the frat-boy trash that defines current country radio music appeal to the soccer mom demographic at all?
November 22, 2013 @ 9:59 pm
Everyone knows pop is popular, no surprise there, but let’s keep it on pop radio where it belongs and country on country radio. Research shows that people want more country and women on country radio but radio ignores it so pop pushers can get their pop and truck songs played. There are many examples of radio playing bad, low listener rated songs to #1 while ignoring far better and higher rated songs. Special deals have to be made with Clear Channel to get the worst or most pop songs played. They should change the name from Artist Intergration Program to Pop Integration Program.
November 22, 2013 @ 2:28 pm
Personally I’ve never “given up”, so to speak, the term “country” and proudly list it among all the genres of music I love whenever I’m asked what I listen to. That being said, its rather annoying to have to follow saying you love country with a comment like “… but not that shit they play on the radio!” which has been the situation for years now. Its not to sound like an elitist douche fishing for “underground” or “scene” points or anything like that, its just that the term “country” has been bastardized by so many over the last few years there are sadly so many people who’s only idea of “country” is the shit that comes out of the Nashville machine you kind of have to say stuff like that.
November 22, 2013 @ 2:40 pm
Good article.
I’ve definitley noticed the trend of positive stories lately, and I’m glad you compiled some of them here. The “12 Reasons to be Positive about Country Music n 2013” article is possibly my favorite on this site and I think it’s a benchmark in illustrating the more optimistic tone this blog has nowadays.
Anyway, I think the wierd thing about the term “country” is that it’s the title of an entrenched radio format in *addition* to being a style of American roots music. Genres like blues, jazz, or say, zydeco, don’t have to straddle dual identities in that way. Like top 40, whatever plays on “country” radio is country, or atleast is perceives as such.
Of course, in other contexts, genres develop to the point that they break off and take on new names like
Blues – > Rhythm and Blues – >; Rock and roll – >; Rock – > Heavy Metal, etc etc.
I guess if the word “country” wasn’t so useful as a marketing term and radio format,
For clarity’s sake, by the middle of the 00’s the popular music coming from Music Row really should have just taken on a new title. But obviously “country” is useful as a marketing term & radio format.
If that actually happened, classic/underground/indepedent country fans wouldn’t be in such an awkward position when trying to explain they like a completely different type of “country,” rather than *that other shit.* In this case, I guess words really do matter.
November 22, 2013 @ 2:57 pm
^ I kind the last part of my comment but hopefully it made sense.
When it comes to restoring the reputation of “country,” it’s pretty freakin’ obvious that the corporations that distribute pop-country aren’t gonna give up the term.
You just want people to know about about the good stuff. I don’t foresee any legislation coming down the line to bust up the monopoly of country radio ownership which would allow for variety. But with Spotify, blogs, social networks, etc. I still think it’s possible to reach a point where almost everyone who has an interest in having other options knows they’re out there. It seems like indie rock has basically reached that point.
November 22, 2013 @ 3:00 pm
Ugh, that should have been *I kind of mangled the last part of my comment but hopefully it made sense*
Trying to write stuff on zero sleep is a bad idea.
November 22, 2013 @ 3:05 pm
Country is radio. If you track back the advent of country, you don’t just find Jimmie Rodgers and The Carter Family, you find WSM and WBAP. It was radio that codified what country was, and regardless of streaming and the internet, in large part it remains that way today, with radio forever being institutionalized through the CMA, which is predominantly made up of radio entities.
I used to think that focusing on radio was silly because it was a dying format. It still may be dying, but for the moment, it still defines what country music is. In my opinion, this is the reason to avoid it and blow it off, We must engage with it and attempt to influence it. I’m not telling folks to listen to corporate radio and try to request them to play Brandy Clark because it will never work. But this is why talking about issues like radio consolidation and Billboard’s charts rules is important.
November 22, 2013 @ 5:29 pm
“I”™m not telling folks to listen to corporate radio and try to request them to play Brandy Clark because it will never work.”
Why not? There is a much greater chance of this happening than there is of any changes in radio consolidation. The important thing is that a significant number of listeners of each station should call and request songs that they want played.
November 22, 2013 @ 11:49 pm
If people want to request their favorite artists and their radio stations are receptive to it, by all means. But the radio stations that are the problem are Clear Channel / Cumulus stations and ones like them with preformatted, nationalized playlists that locals have no control over. That is what I was getting at.
November 23, 2013 @ 12:08 am
Ultimately, large corporations like Clear Channel and Cumulus want to maximize their profit. If a critical mass of listeners demand traditional country under the threat of giving up on the stations entirely, then the radio corporations will be forced to cater to them in order to preserve their profits.
November 22, 2013 @ 8:58 pm
Country music is far more entwined with radio for a few reasons like the CMA as you mentioned but also because historically country music fans have been older and less up to date on the latest technologies. Country was the slowest genre to leave the cassette for the CD and it still is far behind in the transition to digital. For example Luke Bryan’s ‘Crash My Party’ sold 42% of it’s first week units digitally while Jay Z’s ‘Magna Carta’ sold 66% digitally (and they both opened with 528,000 by the way). Eminem sold 58% of “The Marshall Mathers LP 2′ digitally it’s first week. From this I think you can extrapolate out that country fans are generally more wedded to older technologies like radio to hear about new music and new acts. Which leads to the really big problem and that is that country radio is just one big monolithic blob and doesn’t have any of the sub genres that all the other major formats have (Top 40, Rock, R & B/Hip Hop) so it is an extremely difficult ask to get onto country radio if you are not on or affiliated with a major label that can work the hell out of your songs and even then you will probably crash and burn miserably.
But I would say that calling and requesting songs and even more importantly using social media (especially Facebook and Twitter) can work if enough of a groundswell erupts for a song. Using Brandy Clark as an example requesting ‘Stripes’ which is very radio friendly can work especially if it’s pointed out that she wrote ‘Mama’s Broken Heart’ or ‘ Better Dig Two’ which believe me many people making decisions may be unaware of even though they played the hell out of those songs. This is far more effective at small to medium market stations that are not as tied to large radio conglomerates and will take a chance on an independent artist sometimes. Will this work every time? Hell no, but it really is the best shot for some of these artists to get on the radio because the system is rigged against them.
This also is a good strategy if an established act releases a more traditional song to radio and needs a little more work to make it a hit. Like it or not this is the system that country music has and you have to really be persistent if you want it to stick to it’s traditional roots.
November 22, 2013 @ 10:20 pm
I completely agree that radio consolidation and Billboard rule changes are important issues.
But if the goal is to engage and influence radio, and the tradional means of doing so (requesting songs) will never work, then what actual options do we have?
Direct political action? Wait for the media companies to come to the conclusion that the stuff we like is profitable? Direct political action? (Of course, given the diversity of political opinions on this blog, I’m not sure everyone would agree on tightening media ownership regulations )
If you guys can get your local stations to play Brandy Clark, more power to ya! That would be cool. But unless your local country station is independantly owned, radio requests seem like a losing battle. Clear Channel and Cumulus already have the demo-tested playlists are locked in place, and they’re pretty much
the same everywhere.
November 22, 2013 @ 10:30 pm
I want to state that I’m optimistic about the musical situation overall. I think this was a banner year for independent country and roots stuff, and I think more people are going to be catching on to the movement.” Independent music sales overall contine to increase overall.
November 22, 2013 @ 10:43 pm
Yeah it’s very tough to break through no doubt and I for one am against tightening ownership regulations. This country is so over regulated it’s strangling itself slowly. And as I said it is very difficult to get an outsider (no not Eric Church, a real outsider) played but it can be done with the right artist and that’s why I mentioned Brandy Clark who has big time connections but it is a daunting task no doubt.
I’m also moderately optimistic about the music and even if it doesn’t get radio play it can still be very influential and hopefully help to turn the battleship around.
November 22, 2013 @ 4:37 pm
The similarities between country music and political parties here are especially worth noting. There comes a time when grassroots supporters of a major party have to decide whether to stay within the party and fight against the party establishment, or go the third party route. The problem here is that country music resembles the old political party system, where the candidates were selected by party bosses rather than through primaries.
November 22, 2013 @ 8:07 pm
Eric, in other words for the Republican Party would this mean
* Country rap ~ reaching out to minorities by giving illegal immigrants a path to citizenship
* Taylor Swift ~ reaching out to single suburban women who usually vote Democrat
* George Strat ~ Ted Cruz
* Traditional country fans ~ Tea Party supporters
Is that the analogy you had in mind?
November 22, 2013 @ 11:46 pm
I admit that the demographic parallels work better for the Republican analogy. Nevertheless, here are some analogies for the Democratic Party:
country rap – signing free trade agreements that destroy working-class jobs, and reaching out to Republicans, Wall Street, and the health insurance industry by proposing to cut Social Security and Medicare
pop-country – bailing out Wall Street while doing nothing to stop foreclosures, and ditching the health insurance public option to gain the support of the health care industry
George Strait – Bernie Sanders, Sherrod Brown, Elizabeth Warren
traditional country fans – working-class New Deal Democrats
November 23, 2013 @ 1:18 am
Some more Republican analogies:
* George Strait ~ Ronald Reagan, now that I come to think of it
* Gretchen Wilson ~ Sarah Palin
* Toby Keith ~ Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld
* Kacey Musgraves ~ Ron Paul
* Carrie Underwood ~ “compassionate conservatism”
November 22, 2013 @ 4:41 pm
My local radio station red 102.3 in Carlisle pa has a Friday Facebook request party. I got them to play some josh abbott, brandy Clark, even songs about trucks by wade bowen. Now don’t get me wrong the majority of it is pop country but they still play some good songs every now and then.
November 22, 2013 @ 5:17 pm
Your station plays Brandy Clark? Color me envious!
Which of her songs have they played?
November 22, 2013 @ 7:26 pm
Stripes. It was only cause I requested it.
November 22, 2013 @ 7:44 pm
My favorite songs on the album are:
1) “Just Like Him”
2) “What Will Keep Me Out of Heaven”
3) “Hold My Hand”
4) “In Some Corner”.
I really hope that “What Will Keep Me Out of Heaven” is released soon. Not only is it one of the most gorgeous and high quality songs I have heard in a long time, but it also has all the features of a radio hit in the making.
November 22, 2013 @ 6:57 pm
The other avenue is to affect radio. Call the mainstream radio stations in your area request and complain. Who knows, maybe it could make a difference.
Or start a station. It can be done. In Central Illinois for example there is a great little independent radio station, WWHP, that plays roots music of all types and has a cult-like following. It is how I found the new breed of alt country, Red Dirt, Americana, etc. I tell others about it, go to live shows they promote, and generally listen as much as possible.
The concern is that their demographic appears to be mostly middle-aged white men like myself. Not necessarily the group major advertisers are looking for I suppose but it appears to be doing well enough.
November 23, 2013 @ 7:19 am
There’s always a hope, a very little hope I guess but always is. The quote from Tompall Glasser made my hope stronger. I’m sceptic about the future of country music, but we all believe that some day something might change for better. We, reading the articles at this website, the author, Mr. Triggerman, and of course lots of underground, real country musicians believe, too. If we hadn’t any hope, what all the efforts and interest put into the idea of saving country music would be?
November 25, 2013 @ 1:04 am
Just as a heads up, Trig, here in Arkansas we had a favorite radio DJ named Bob Robbins quit his work for KSSN 96, citing that the new direction of the music being played “wasn’t country” in an announcement. Robbins had been at the station for 30 years, though the article in this link doesn’t quote his statement on the air. It’s telling that one of the most successful country DJs in history has decided to quit.
http://www.arktimes.com/RockCandy/archives/2013/11/18/bob-robbins-leaving-kssn-going-to-sister-station-the-wolf-1051