Garth Brooks Says Quiet Part Out Loud About Country Radio

Garth Brooks sat down for an in-depth interview with Billboard‘s Melinda Newman on June 7th as part of the publication’s “Billboard Country Live” event. It was part of last week’s massive CMA Fest in Nashville. Garth talked about a host of subjects, including how he wants to make five more Chris Gaines albums, and that he’ll be stocking Bud Light at his new night spot on Lower Broadway in Nashville.
Even though these tidbits made for tasty headlines and ample coverage (there are now hundreds of click bait stories about the Bud Light comments alone), it might have been Garth’s comments about corporate country radio that were the most newsworthy, despite the media virtually ignoring them.
Garth Brooks is starting his own radio network via TuneIn this summer. It will include a host of stations curated by Garth himself. We’ll have to see just how good the stations are and how successful the venture is, but the news allowed Melinda Newman of Billboard to pick Garth’s brain about his feelings on country radio in general, and Garth surprisingly said the quiet part out loud.
“I think radio is a reflection of the labels’ agenda … the labels simply own radio, they just do,” Garth Brooks said. “They can say they don’t, or radio can say they don’t, but the truth is that nobody is going to get played on there that doesn’t have a major-label deal … So what this does is, just because the label might think that George Strait’s career is past the label part, I want to hear the new stuff from George Strait. Just because … all the sudden The Chicks were cancelled, don’t make the mistake of thinking their music wasn’t any good. Their music was fantastic. My thing is, I want to hear the new stuff from Luke Combs, followed by the new song from The Chicks, followed by Lainey Wilson.”
Though what Garth Brooks said is 100% correct and it’s patently obvious to everyone, the fallacy of radio independence is what persists because so many are afraid to speak about it publicly in the country industry. It’s not dissimilar to when popular DJ Bobby Bones made similar statements in 2021, and got in hot water for it.
“Here’s the truth about No. 1 songs: It’s politics,” Bones said in part. “They trade them out like baseball cards. A record label will talk to another record label and go, ‘OK, I’ll give you this No. 1 on this date; you give me that No. 1 on that date.’ Which really, it just should be the song that’s the most wanted, the most listened to, the song that people demand … and so when you hear someone talk about a No. 1 song, I would say half of them aren’t legitimate No. 1 songs.”
Along with exposing who is really in control of corporate country radio and who is to blame for the insular and unimaginative nature of the format, the comments from Garth also undercut the attacks of people who raise concerns about country radio’s lack of diversity. It’s not radio that’s to blame directly, it’s the labels. Myopically focusing on radio is missing the forest for the trees, and failing to address the underlying problem. That is why the constant flow of studies complaining about country radio’s diversity have failed to make a dent in the dilemma, or to address it in any substantive manner.
On the diversity issues with country radio, Garth Brooks also had some reasonable, heterodox views to share.
“The one thing that’s bad for me,” Brooks said, “is if you don’t play somebody because of the color of their skin or their gender. It’s as equally wrong if you do play somebody because of the color of their skin and their gender. My thing is, let the music decide. Sometimes there’s going to be less women because the women aren’t putting out new stuff yet, and sometimes there’s going to be more women because the women are putting out new stuff. That’s what I want to see.”
One of the reasons there are less women and people of color on country radio is because there are less of these groups making country music. There are other underlying, more systematic issues too like the ingrained idea that country fans just don’t want to hear women that make it harder for women to get radio play. But there is also an inventory issue that is rarely addressed in these matters.
Big corporate radio continues to lose market share to streaming services and podcasts, and for the reason’s that Garth Brooks and Bobby Bones cite. These are two individuals who’ve been on the inside of the corporate country system and benefited greatly from it, and can speak with authority on the matter as good as anyone.
If country radio is going to survive, it needs to start playing what fans want to hear as opposed to what major labels want them to. Even Garth Brooks and Bobby Bones know this.
June 15, 2023 @ 9:58 am
Yeah, but didn’t he kill somebody?????
June 15, 2023 @ 12:15 pm
I still have no idea what this means and I am ok with that..
June 15, 2023 @ 1:16 pm
did garth brooks just admit to sucking and only being played because his label wanted it that way? they seemingly only gave him a #1 because his label told them to. it all makes sense now
“It’s as equally wrong if you play somebody because of the color of their skin and their gender. My thing is, let the music decide. Sometimes there’s going to be less women because the women aren’t putting out new stuff yet”
uh oh boomer going to get himself cancelled talking about affirmative action and touching the 3rd rail
June 15, 2023 @ 2:18 pm
Hopefully not, that’s a pretty reasonable statement. As Trig notes, I’ve seen a hundred articles on his comments about serving Bud Light, nothing on his comments on radio or gender/race yet. Not saying it won’t transition to that, or that there won’t be one or two virtue signaling writers that runs with it and misinterprets it, but so far it’s just more Bud Light.
June 15, 2023 @ 4:01 pm
In Garth’s heyday–the early and mid- 90s, he was one of a group of core artists on country radio and was in no way “dominant” over the others. Alan, B&D, Strait, Diffie, Tracy, Chesnutt, Vince, Clint, Tritt, and later Tim and Kenny and Shania. did as well on the radio chart–some a bit better, some a bit worse–than Garth. Toby’s first single was often reported as the most played record on radio in the 90s.
Where Garth really dominated was in album sales and concert tickets.
You can like or not like Garth, think he’s full of this or that, etc., but it’s the public that was buying him back then. And he didn’t make it because of his looks, either.
June 15, 2023 @ 10:01 am
Garth usually talks sense. He is clearly right. Does anyone really listen to country radio these days or radio in general? Hasn’t streaming taken over to a large extent? It would be interesting to compare the size of radio audiences today compared to a few years ago.
June 15, 2023 @ 3:08 pm
Im sure it depends what market you re in. We have a couple country stations in Austin I am happy with and listen to. Its especially convenient in the truck driving around. When I visit family in other states where country is popular, I cant stand what they play- just commercial pop country crap. Dont forget SiriusXM. Definitely some good stations on there too- not sure if that counts as radio.
June 15, 2023 @ 10:02 am
Since you have your SCM top 25 playlist, I almost never turn on the radio anymore, except for a few SXM stations.
June 15, 2023 @ 10:06 am
Even that comment can’t veer away from politics. The DIXIE chicks burned their own bridges by not keeping their opinions to themselves. For a very long time Garth was the same way, But apparently he’s now falling into the same trap.
There’s nothing wrong with selling bud light in his new bar if he believes that is a wise business decision. But that’s not what he said. He said that we are assholes if we disagree with them.
That’s news. Saying something about radio airplay that everybody already knows is not exactly newsworthy. But knowing that Garth couldn’t keep his liberalism to himself is extremely disappointing.
June 15, 2023 @ 10:17 am
Are you not guilty of the same thing? Keeping ones opinion to themselves seems to be hard to do.
June 15, 2023 @ 8:24 pm
Cancel him is bars and concerts. Bud target kohl’s now garth .
June 15, 2023 @ 10:21 am
No, it’s not news. If you’re against Bud Light, you won. They pulled their publicity campaign and replaced it with an equally signaling and underhanded “Ra Ra Amerrica!” campaign. Sales have tanked. It was game over a month ago. You’re getting spun up by the media that has made millions of dollars sowing this culture war nontroversy.
So the Dixie Chicks got cancelled because they couldn’t keep their opinions to themselves. How comfortable are you with someone telling YOU to keep your opinions to yourself? It doesn’t appear very well.
This is a country music website, not a culture war forum. Garth Brooks exposing who REALLY controls country radio is definitely newsworthy here. The idiotic blow by blow over Bud Light is not.
June 15, 2023 @ 10:56 am
I’m against Bud Light because it sucks.
Life’s too short to drink cheap beer
June 15, 2023 @ 12:26 pm
When people ask why I’m drinking Bud Light, I respond with the same reason Seinfeld wanted to return the jacket he bought: “for spite. I don’t particularly care for the people boycotting it, so I’m drinking it out of spite.”
June 15, 2023 @ 2:09 pm
From what I’ve seen, the people pissed about the Bud Light boycott are people who are just upset the right has finally joined the left at their own game. They also are upset that the boycott is working. If the boycott was of a company that was donating money to Desantis or Trump, opposed abortion, or that supported conservative Christian values, would the people upset about the boycott even care? No, they’d say, where can I sign up to boycott! It’s humorous actually.
June 15, 2023 @ 3:13 pm
I didn’t realize so many conservatives drank shitty beer. Nor did i realize conservatives cared so much about morality and character of the people who they vote for… Its comical actually.
Garth knows what he is doing at this point in his life. Musically he can do what he wants and realizes that by including everyone at his establishment will be far more lucrative than not. The idea that a beer boycott some how “punishes” the left shows how little people think their plans out. Who does it hurt? The investors. The investors who get their dividend check from a foreign owned business.
June 15, 2023 @ 3:44 pm
@WhysoQuiet – “From what I’ve seen, the people pissed about the Bud Light boycott are people who are just upset the right has finally joined the left at their own game.”
I’m not sure what world you’re residing in, but the right have been the biggest practitioners of cancel culture in my lifetime. From violent video games, films and Marilyn Manson records being responsible for Columbine, to Harry Potter promoting witchcraft, to the aforementioned Dixie Chicks situation, to being triggered over Starbucks cups, NFL players kneeling, trying to get comedians fired for making jokes about former President Trump, etc. And I’ve lost track of all of the companies they’re boycotting these days.
I suppose you could go way back and point to Tipper Gore and the PMRC, but that was really a bipartisan group of snowflakes who she was the most famous member of. And Republicans had already been engaging in cancel culture for decades by that point. You may have heard of Sen. Joseph McCarthy, for example.
Meanwhile, I’m as liberal as they come and I’ve never let that stop me from enjoying Hank Jr. records, Clint Eastwood movies and the like.
I haven’t had Bud Light in years, but Anheuser-Busch doesn’t give a shit if you boycott it. As of this week, Modelo is now the top selling beer in the U.S. Anheuser-Busch owns Modelo. Likewise, Disney loves it when Fox News and conservatives online give their movies free publicity.
Garth Brooks is one of the top-selling artists of all time and THE top-selling in country music. He didn’t get to that position by aligning himself with unpopular minority viewpoints. He operates in the real world where Republicans have gotten the majority of votes in a presidential election only once since he released his debut album, not the gerrymandered, electoral college world that has allowed them to retain power despite this.
He knows exactly what he’s doing and he’s going to make a fortune from it.
June 15, 2023 @ 1:43 pm
I mean,am I the only person who thinks the Chicks got cancelled not for Marines remarks about former President Bush, but for unwisely engaging in a public spat with Toby Kieth? Toby was the biggest country star in the world at that time. That FUTK shirt Maines wore at the ACMs seemed like the final straw.
Everyone has the right to express their opion, no matter how offensive or stupid those opinions are, but people react how they react, and sometimes they react with negativity or hostility – I think Jerry demobstates that quite well.
June 15, 2023 @ 1:50 pm
I don’t believe this at all. I also don’t believe they got cancelled because they had gotten “too big” as women in country, and so the industry decided to step in. When the [Dixie] Chicks got cancelled, they were one of the top artists in all of country music. They were making lots and lots of money for this industry. This is not to let the industry off at all, but there is no need for conspiracy theories to prive they got done wrong. It’s a blemish on country music history.
June 15, 2023 @ 3:58 pm
I don’t find it to be a blemish at all. It’s one thing in private conversation or even in a talk show situation to say well I don’t really think we should be fighting this war. But when you are a musical act and and having a concert in another country and come out ranting about the president and saying a lot of nasty stuff about our countries actions, trying to apologize for our country, you don’t deserve any goodness.
June 15, 2023 @ 5:22 pm
That makes sense.
Either way, it’s a travesty. The Chicks were good for country music.
June 15, 2023 @ 7:10 pm
Trig,
Of course Garth’s take on the Bud Light thing is news, you goober. You don’t get to decide something isn’t news just because you’re a spineless, fence-sitting normie.
Hard working people from middle-America, which includes many of Garth’s fans, executed a crippling boycott against the corporate groomer agenda, and Garth turned against them. That’s a Country Music news story, even if little Trigger doesn’t like it.
Yes, we won, and that’s great, but this was only one battle.
June 15, 2023 @ 7:58 pm
“crippling boycott against the corporate groomer agenda,”
When did this happen? Did conservatives shut down Walmart? The Bud light dip is a blip on the screen for InBev. When the next “woke” thing to be outraged by comes along it will be forgotten.
June 15, 2023 @ 8:42 pm
Honky, this has nothing to do with me being a “normie.” It has to do with me knowing this Bud Light bullshit is a distraction.
June 15, 2023 @ 10:22 am
1) It’s The CHICKS, not the Dixie Chicks. They made the decision on their own to make that change.
2) They didn’t burn any bridge. They spoke their opinion and they were canceled by the very people who now complain about cancel culture. Hell, even now, you are talking about how Garth is “falling into the same trap” (essentially admitting the right is going to boycott him because of his opinions) and trying to cancel Bud Light because you disagree with them (the very same thing you accuse Garth of).
I got news for ya Jerry….you ARE an asshole.
June 15, 2023 @ 12:32 pm
1) I still call them the Dixie Chicks, just like I dont say Lady A but Lady Antebellum.
2)The folks who were pissed about The Dixie Chicks getting canceled and were pro-free speech and antiwar, in 2023, now are for silencing Aldean, Aaron Lewis, and Morgan, and promote war with Russia, think if you are anti vaccine you need to be deplatformed and are for cutting the bank access of people who support Trump.
Got news for ya, ID, you might want to invest in a mirror or a kettle. Just sayin
June 15, 2023 @ 1:18 pm
1.Edgy
2.Bullshit.
June 15, 2023 @ 1:56 pm
I think Blair pretty much summed up your comment.
No need for me to build the lilly
June 15, 2023 @ 2:13 pm
No lillies were guilded in general in the first place, so Im fine with that, partner.
June 15, 2023 @ 1:57 pm
I think Blair summed up your comment nicely.
No need for me to guild the lilly.
June 15, 2023 @ 1:17 pm
We know its The Chicks and thats what they want to be called.
But a bunch of us have nicknamed them the Dixie Chicks. Its a good nickname that recalls some great times in my life with great music.
I remember working for $15 an hr to pay $30 for a dixie chicks album, and i bought all of them and loved them.
Garth can call them what he wants, you can call them what you want, Jerry can call them what he wants, I call them what I want.
Its how nicknames work. I have some good ones for some annoying people in the comments section as.
June 15, 2023 @ 7:12 pm
I was thrilled when the Dixie Chicks got cancelled, although, it was stomach-churning to have to cancel them for a member of the Bush family.
June 15, 2023 @ 12:14 pm
The cancellation of the Dixie Chicks in the 00’s was completely wrong. Consumers should always have the liberty to choose what they “comsume” but radio in the 00’s was a platform and their wholesale banning is such a blot on the “freedom-loving” political base.
June 15, 2023 @ 1:44 pm
Utterly ridiculous. The glaring omission in your whole piece of tired talking points : you only want to hear about only politics you like. Grow up.
June 15, 2023 @ 7:09 pm
Jerry, where did he say in the Billboard article where all the headlines originated from that you were an asshole if you disagreed with him? Here’s the exact quote:
“I know this sounds corny,” he continued, “I want it to be the Chick-fil-A of honky-tonks … I want it to be a place you feel safe in, I want it to be a place where you feel like there are manners and people like one another. And yes, we’re going to serve every brand of beer. We just are. It’s not our decision to make. Our thing is this, if you [are let] into this house, love one another. If you’re an a–hole, there are plenty of other places on lower Broadway.”
You’re only an asshole if you plan on going to his bar to cause trouble instead of being nice NOT if you drink a certain beer. The clickbait headlines skipped over the love one another part and turned it into something completely different.
June 15, 2023 @ 10:13 am
To think that commercial radio is/has been anything other than business is a ridicules notion. Of course deals are made, of course they pander to the dumbest subset of listens as trucks/chicks/beer sell advertising. And when they are done using an artist they cast them aside and repeat the cycle.
Just like supporting all the great artists out there, support all the Public Radio stations who play the music commercial radios stations don’t.
June 15, 2023 @ 10:15 am
Amen amen and amen to that. Garth is spot on. And for what it’s worth, I never got the dislike for Garth. You listen to ‘beaches of Cheyenne’ and tell me that the man doesn’t know a thing or two about country music.
The album, fresh horses might be one of my favorite fifty country albums.
And I have shared that same opinion that I want to hear the best music available, whether it’s made by old men, or all women, or by all people of the same nationality. I know that that might be a polarizing opinion to some people, and one that’s easy to take out of context, but I just want to listen to the best music I can find, and I don’t really care who is making it.
And I think the radio disconnect comes from listeners, not understanding how the system actually works, and from the people making decisions, failing to understand why people are switching formats
Sure, not wanting to hear commercials is a part of it, but I think some people simply over estimate the value that local news and events has on radio listening. With social media, where it is, we simply don’t need the radio to tell us what’s going on in our communities. But I think summer radio executives don’t grasp that yet, and still think that just having a local personality and news will keep people listening.
But the simple fact of it is that the people who are most invested in the value of music, and the process of music are not people who would ever listen to a radio station anyway. They are dinosaurs like me who have a bucket of CDs in the car. People who read liner notes because they want to learn about the artist and the studio musicians, and the history of the traditional songs that got recorded.
There’s a reason independent country is so strong, despite limited radio, appeal, and sometimes limited media growth. The same reason that Jazz is popular, despite having no meaningful main stream presence. I couldn’t tell you the last time I even recognized that anyone was listening to jazz. But I guarantee you if I walked into a crowded restaurant and asked if anyone had listen to anything by Miles Davis lately I could find a jazz enthusiast and have a good conversation. Jazz survived this long. Independent country will do just fine.
June 15, 2023 @ 11:08 am
Jazz kept it’s integrity. It’s funny reading about how there was a backlash in the Jazz community against Diana Krall because she had pop success and looked “hot” on her album covers.
I ordered more cassette tapes from discogs to play in the car. Physical media is king.
June 15, 2023 @ 11:40 am
Beaches of Cheyenne was the best song on an underwhelming album
June 15, 2023 @ 12:28 pm
Ok, probably being really bad here.
Not only jazz, but Blues as well.
Tab Benoit.
Mmmmm, mmmmm, mmmmm …
That boy can make a guitar sing, like no other.
Okay, well in the same league as Mr. Buddy Guy.
Buddy’s son, is pretty ???? on the guitar, as well.
June 15, 2023 @ 10:44 am
I don’t want to hear women, because I’m a man and want to listen to songs from a perspective I can relate to.
Why is this so hard for you to accept?
June 15, 2023 @ 10:49 am
Now that’s funny!
June 15, 2023 @ 11:00 am
I didn’t ask if it was funny. I asked why it’s so hard for you to accept. Care to answer?
June 15, 2023 @ 11:12 am
Because the idea that a person discounts other peoples ideas or experiences and ultimately songs based simply on their gender is moronic and nonsensical. Especially when male singers sing songs by female writers or cover songs by female artists all the time. Do you surround yourself with only people who think like you as well?
June 15, 2023 @ 4:10 pm
It’s not about discounting anything. A person listens to what they like. I don’t listen to a lot of female singers regularly. Most of my favorites are males though not all. But if trig throws out a song or puts up an album review by a female, lots of times I give it a shot. Sometimes I find some great stuff but I’m not going to force myself to listen to stuff just to fill some left wing quota. If a particular artist isn’t for me, I don’t listen.
June 15, 2023 @ 4:25 pm
Cool story.
Who forces themselves to listen to music? Left wing quota? Didn’t know a thing like that existed.
June 15, 2023 @ 4:44 pm
Why are you so whiny? All I said was that I don’t typically enjoy listening to female singers. It’s not intentionally based on gender; it’s based on the fact that I don’t enjoy it.
June 15, 2023 @ 7:39 pm
“I don’t want to hear women, because I’m a man and want to listen to songs from a perspective I can relate to.
Why is this so hard for you to accept?”
This is what you wrote. Sorry I misunderstood the words you wrote…
June 15, 2023 @ 10:55 am
Loretta Lynn? Dolly? Bobby Gentry?
Dude, you are missing out
June 15, 2023 @ 11:03 am
No I’m not. I didn’t say I’ve never listened to women. I said I don’t want to…generally.
I want to know why Kyle is either unwilling or unable to accept that people have individual preferences.
June 15, 2023 @ 1:43 pm
“i want to know why [someone] is either unwilling or unable to accept that people have individual preferences”
please refrain from repeating communist sentiments in the comment section.
June 15, 2023 @ 4:40 pm
Huh?
June 15, 2023 @ 11:07 am
This makes me sad for you. There is so much good music made by women that isn’t sex-specific. You can’t relate to “The House That Built Me” in any kind of way? So so many songs that can translate into anyone’s life.
June 15, 2023 @ 2:33 pm
What is crazy is “The House That Built Me” was written by two guys. The way Miranda sings it, you’d think it was her story. Blake Shelton was actually first slated to record the song.
June 15, 2023 @ 4:46 pm
Don’t feel sad. Be happy that I’m happy listening to what I enjoy.
June 15, 2023 @ 11:11 am
Listen to Patty Loveless. She was probably one of the best at picking songs that had a view from the eyes of both genders. Man.. Kathy Griffin, Lucinda Williams, Martina Mcbride, Leann Womack, just pick an album and listen all the way thru. There are many good female artists that avoided the whole “girl power” thing.
June 15, 2023 @ 11:36 am
As a red-blooded male, there is nothing that I love more than listening to a woman pouring her pining heart out. I think it’s beautiful, and I feel sorry for any men not secure enough in their manhood (or women in their womanhood) to not be able to enjoy the expressions and perspectives of the opposite sex. Taste is subjective, and if folks like men more than women, so be it. But when you open yourself up to the other perspective of life, you can enjoy ALL of life and music in a more fulfilling manner.
June 15, 2023 @ 3:32 pm
Jennifer Nettles poured her heart out on “Stay”. By rights, she should have had a #1 record with it. But “Our song is the slam of screen doors” kept it at #2. More of this baseball card trading, I suppose.
June 15, 2023 @ 4:46 pm
Don’t feel sad. Be happy that I’m happy listening to what I enjoy.
June 15, 2023 @ 4:51 pm
Kyle,
If you enjoy it that much, then listen to it, although I don’t believe you enjoy it that much.
I’m just asking why all of you feel the need to incessantly whine about it that many of us prefer listening to male singers.
You’re never going to force people to enjoy something they don’t.
June 15, 2023 @ 12:01 pm
you can’t relate to women going through universal experiences of love, loss, desires, etc.? well if that isn’t the most incel thing i heard today.
give me a can of beans and an hour and i’ll make some music you can probably really relate to.
June 15, 2023 @ 4:55 pm
No, I can’t. You should definitely whine about other people’s preferences some more.
I’ve mentioned this before, but “incel” is such a useless, toothless insult. People who are incels call themselves incels. So if you call someone an incel because you believe they aren’t one, you’re defacto acknowledging they aren’t one.
June 15, 2023 @ 12:26 pm
This is a valid point, and Garth is correct. I disagree and a fan of many female country musicians, but for the last decade plus, in larger society all we’ve heard is that representation matters. Seeing people who look like you, are you, and vote like you on the screen or in the industry seems to be the most important thing in the world. We’ve heard ad nauseam that all companies, all record labels, all society needs equal amounts of all groups in all situations, even though thats not possible. People cant relate to Superman because he’s a straight white man, so all comic book movies need diverse casts in all situations. Black Panther was considered the most diverse movie in decades. Garth is correct. Society as constructed in the last 20 years or since 1965, has been this modus opurandi. We’ve been fed for decades the idea country doesnt care about diverse populations, even when the biggest stars in country are black, women, or lbgtq. How many times have we heard the line women dont get played on the radio? If the goal is to make all of society equal in all situations, and this is impossible, then we are at loggerheads. Country music cannot have diversity in all situations. It’s not possible, nor is it desirable. Good country is good country, regardless of who releases it and what their background is. Woke country has no place in Nashville, it shouldn’t be catered to, nor given a seat at the table. Woke country needs to leave and never look back. The focus needs to go back on well crafted songs, as opposed to filling quotas and diversity hires and affirmative action.
June 15, 2023 @ 1:01 pm
To the extent this is true, I feel bad that your perspective on music and how to relate to it is so narrow.
To the extent it’s a troll, I feel bad that you have nothing better to do with your time.
June 15, 2023 @ 11:05 am
Whenever I hear Tracy Lawrence’s show on WSM, it’s always playing stale old radio hits. I HIGHLY doubt that Garth will be some vessel to truly great country on radio. Hell WSM is now mostly un-listenable during the weekdays. I’m not sure why terrestrial radio still exists in 2023. The music that people want to hear is getting played via the internet; and that’s Zach Bryan, Morgan Wallen, Luke Combs, Tyler Childers etc.
And this is just empty platitudes:
“The one thing that’s bad for me,” Brooks said, “is if you don’t play somebody because of the color of their skin or their gender. It’s as equally wrong if you do play somebody because of the color of their skin and their gender.
Can one example be named of someone held back from radio simply because of the color of their skin or gender? And women and men both prefer to hear more male country artists over female artists. Hopefully Garth will end this moral grandstanding by having a women-only station.
The articles online about Garth selling Bud Light in his bar are stupid. What bar would refuse to sell a major brand? I am all for the boycotts though. No company is entitled to someone else’s money and they aren’t entitled to keep their own chunk of the market share. No one is infringing on their right to conduct business – it is not a cancellation. If “Pride” is going to unabashedly sign-off on everything all the letters do (in this case the T’s) and not allow any criticism and label it an attack on the whole acronym, then in turn companies pledging allegiance to pride may take a financial hit. Perhaps corporations shouldn’t be so bold and reckless with their advertising campaigns and avoid resorting to gaslighting when it backfires. The memes online are correct – big corporations don’t put rainbows on their ads in many other countries.
June 15, 2023 @ 8:30 pm
“Can one example be named of someone held back from radio simply because of the color of their skin or gender?”
Mickey Guyton.
June 15, 2023 @ 11:06 am
Garth is a business. He is all about business. I believe all his goals and aspirations revolve around a $ figure. His comments on the business are usually right on. Don’t hear Garth hardly ever now on radio. So he is looking for new avenues to bring in the $.
June 15, 2023 @ 11:08 am
Okay, trigger where is my post? I stayed on topic, please post my comment, if you think I was trying to be too political, GARTH made thar statement political, he knew what he was saying. And my post just pointed out the real reasons what he was saying, I posted far more controversial post before and you posted them, and I went off topic, so when I stay on topic, your not going to post it? I have a transgender family member who faces these same kind of bigoted and hateful responses and this is important I think people need to know why garth said no ass holes allowed before people start their bull shit. “HE DOESNT LIKE PEOPLE WITH DIFFERENCES OF OPINIONS, like I said. Bull shit. So please post my comment, thank you.
June 15, 2023 @ 11:31 am
Countryfan68,
You went so far and beyond off topic, and you know it.
I’m not going to play games with this article. This is an article about Garth’s feelings on country radio. If all folks want to do is leave comments about other stuff, I’m just going to shut it down.
June 15, 2023 @ 11:28 am
Country radio along with all of radio has completely corrupted US culture. The music is manufactured in a lab. It’s completely lazy and devoid of substance. Explains why the masses are what they are. Those of us that seek good music and support it are generally above the fray of the mouth breathing knuckle draggers on twitter. Hope Garth can sway some folks to use their nose.
June 15, 2023 @ 11:31 am
Well, I never thought I would say this but I applaud Garth for his comments about Country Radio, but at the same time I find it kind of ironic to hear this from Garth since he has been playing the politics of the system when he hit the spotlight back in ’89. As for the “Dixie” Chicks situation what happened to them 20 years ago was complete & utter B.S. thanks to the events of 9/11 there was a huge shift towards patriotism for our nation which was understandable but it caused us as a nation to be blind to what was going on. Natalie & her band mates suffered for stating their opinions… opinions that actually turned out to be true. The Iraq war was B.S. Saddam didn’t have any connections to Bin Laden & he didn’t have any “weapons of mass destruction” & to be honest the war in Afghanistan was a waste of time cause the Taliban have taken it back over, & no I do not blame Biden for this problem (even though I do believe he is a lousy President) the fact is this was always gonna happen no matter who is President, so I blame Bush for putting us in there to begin with.
Getting back to the subject at hand. I haven’t listened to mainstream Country Radio in over 20 years. I haven’t listened to Country Radio in so long I couldn’t name you any of the new artists to hit the scene in the last decade what little of the new mainstream stuff I have managed to hear recently sounds even worse than the stuff from the 90s & mid 2000s. Wish radio would go back to the way it was in the 60s & 70s when college kids got to play stuff that caught their attention that’s how Skynyrd hit the scene, I have often wondered how many Skynyrds we have missed out on over the last two or three decades since the labels took control the airwaves.
June 15, 2023 @ 11:32 am
For freedom of speech right trigger, yeah, whatever, you run your little site the way you want, will you please send me a guide of what I can and cannot say? I don’t know any more. Seriously how pathetic.
June 15, 2023 @ 11:32 am
Folks, this is an article about country radio and who controls it. If it descends into a bunch of garbage about Bud Light, I’m just going to shut this comments section down. Either we all cooperate and we can keep the discussion open, or we don’t. Choice is yours.
June 15, 2023 @ 1:21 pm
This is the community you foster when you ride the fence and are too afraid to call out conservative bigotry within country music fandom.
June 15, 2023 @ 1:25 pm
: D Hey Adam,
Shut the hell up, with your bigotry
June 15, 2023 @ 4:39 pm
Its OK Di. He is bigoted in the name of tolerance so he is exempt. No such luck for the rest of us.
June 15, 2023 @ 1:27 pm
And, by the way,
Tab Benoit also plays a Very Mean pedal steel.
Blues, country, you name it.
June 15, 2023 @ 2:02 pm
The only thing I try to foster here is an open forum for everyone to share their opinions. There are multiple examples of me calling out bigotry in this very comments section.
June 15, 2023 @ 3:03 pm
In the Isbell album review you stepped in when someone called out bigotry, but failed to actually address the original posts. A poster ranked women by race and you did nothing. You have failed to call out bigotry, you just threaten to shut down comments sections without ever actually condemning the speech.
June 15, 2023 @ 12:04 pm
If radio is controlled by labels why don’t some major label artists get airplay? It seems like labels put a lot of effort into promoting singles for some artists and they still don’t go anywhere. (Not disagreeing with the article just trying to understand how it all works.)
June 15, 2023 @ 12:13 pm
Often major labels put their emphasis behind the artists they believe will make them the most money. Just because you’re on a major label, doesn’t mean you’re going to get major representation. Sunny Sweeney calls it the “Artist Protection Program.” They sign you to a contract, and then forget about you in favor of the bigger stars.
It’s also true that labels try to promote singles, and they just don’t resonate. But if a label puts enough money behind a song, it will probably go to the top.
June 15, 2023 @ 1:49 pm
So I that case, is it better for artists such as Sweeney not to sign with a major label? If they are signed and aren’t getting a push because the label is promoting other,bigger artists, what is the point of signing?
June 15, 2023 @ 1:58 pm
It really depends which label, and at what time. Curb Records was one of the best labels in country. Then they became known for disappearing careers. Sweeny signed with Big Machine, and I’m sure at the time, they thought she was going to be a big star, and then she spent years fighting for attention.
I will say that stuff has gotten much better with labels over the last few years. Artists have too many options now to sign a bad contract, but it still happens.
June 15, 2023 @ 4:12 pm
Thanks, I appreciate the explanation. Frustrating industry to follow sometimes. My favorite singles tend to be the lowest charting.
June 15, 2023 @ 6:30 pm
“Sunny Sweeney calls it the “Artist Protection Program.””
I knew artists in Nashville who were saying this back when Sunny was still in Jr. High. “I was (or I am) in the witness protection program over at (insert label here)” was a frequent joke. Warner Brothers and Curb were the worst, but I’m sure every label did it.
June 15, 2023 @ 12:11 pm
Garth you are quite the man and I would like to say God bless your parents for the way they raised you to know that all people are created equally and hell to anyone who thinks differently…God bless you
June 15, 2023 @ 12:42 pm
I would include that this is not just a “label influence” problem, but hand-to-hand a big radio problem. And it’s not just a Nashville problem. Texas country music genre has its own stations, own charts – and deserving artists still struggle to get played even when on format. Several artists in TX have scored multiple #1 hits across multiple TX charts, yet do not get air play on some of the bigger stations. Artists and their fan bases are forced to push, plead and beg for spins on smaller, independent stations to compete with larger artists that get played every hour on the larger stations. A lot of “Texas Country” stations have devolved into playing a modest portion of post-grunge sounding “Shred Dirt”. It’s simply mind boggling to hear Gary P. Nunn in the same rotation as Pecos & the Rooftops. REK and then Koe Wetzel.
Politics in radio exists everywhere, in every genre. Even larger independent stations do not play what listeners want to hear with any level of responsibility to the listener. If the Program Director doesn’t like the artist, or the artist hasn’t kissed enough ass – they don’t get played.
Streaming is more of the same. Many of the so called “Texas Country” playlists on Apple Music include artists with zero ties to Texas – if it sounds neo-traditional, it gets thrown in. All the while hard-working, deserving artists actually from TX get shut out.
I hope Garth’s intentions are genuine, and the product, if it is what he says it will be – is successful. Good music needs another angle. It is too hard for independent artists to make waves without huge money… and the world is missing out on a lot of phenomenal talent and good country music.
June 15, 2023 @ 12:43 pm
Spend time as an independent artist talking to Program Directors, and you will see that Garth is 100% correct. When I call, the PDs know my name, know my songs, and tell me what they like about songs. Then, I get the same line, “the schedule is really tight, but I am trying to squeeze your song into the playlist.”
It’s so tight that they play the same seven adult contemporary songs posing as country seven times or more a day. Why? Because the corporate overlords at the big labels say so.
June 15, 2023 @ 12:50 pm
All this about male or female or diversity in country music is BS, I don’t care. I want to listen to a station that plays GOOD OLD COUNTRY MUSIC, YOU KNOW, REAL COUNTRY MUSIC.
June 15, 2023 @ 1:04 pm
Sometimes I wonder whether the radio/label relationship, to which this site has opened my eyes, has actually succeeded in maximizing commercial gain through its current model. Country radio was my musical upbringing, but I have never mourned the innocence lost when I first heard “Feathered Indians”. So many listeners of my generation share this experience – we had no sense of the greatness this genre had to offer and were shocked to discover that it was largely concealed below the FM tip of the country music iceberg.
How many people can you name who opted to continue consuming radio country after being exposed to Turnpike and the like? My personal anecdotes skew so heavily toward converts that I’ve begun to question Nashville’s premise [that there is more money to be made in the pop-country arena]. Independent country is seemingly more resonant and mobilizing; if popularity is truly downstream of spins as Bobby Bones intimates, then the decision to ignore it is baffling from a business perspective. What am I missing?
June 15, 2023 @ 1:11 pm
Well,the reason for the paucity of women and POC (I’m a black man) in Country is the former were ignored by labels after the 90’s because many female listeners desired handsome cowboys over other women and bought the studs’ songs,no matter how inane.(How do you think Sam Hunt’s utterly dumb “Body Like A Back Road” topped the charts for almost two-thirds of a year if not for the ladies who saw a budding Luke Bryan/Brad Paisley type they could turn into a radio love interest ?)
On the other hand,I AM a handsome cowboy,but black,and we were kept off the Country charts (save Charlie Pride,who became Country’s token Negro) by bigoted record label owners and radio PDs for fear some hot Southern babe might find us handsome and….you know what might happen and where it might happen.) So that’s why the good ol’ boys predominate because the ladies and black lads have been historically kept away from the biggest and best labels and the concomitant airplay .
June 15, 2023 @ 1:41 pm
Garth is correct. And I’m no fan of the guy. But you can’t even go with Sirius now either. I just quit them. I’m paying to get away from politics and commercials yet I found both creeping into the Sirius channels I liked. I mean they have specific channels just for politics and opinion but they started crossing that line so I cut them. A music channel on a paid service like Sirius should talk about the song or artist and that is it if you want me to pay for it.
June 15, 2023 @ 1:42 pm
Just wake me up the day Dale Watson or Nick Shoulders have a #1 song on the radio.
June 15, 2023 @ 1:58 pm
Is this why he made the big announcement today about Live 615 or whatever it’s called w/ Tune In?
June 15, 2023 @ 2:09 pm
Yes, Garth was asked a question about it last week, and this was his response.
June 15, 2023 @ 3:58 pm
I don’t care what they call me. Outside of Miranda, Lainey and a few others, most women artist suck and always have.
June 15, 2023 @ 5:23 pm
i would feel this way too if women recoiled every time i entered the room or opened my mouth.
June 15, 2023 @ 5:29 pm
If that’s your opinion, you don’t listen to enough music. There are LOTS of women putting out quality music. There are more generic dudes putting out music than generic chicks.
June 15, 2023 @ 4:09 pm
Well if he says what he means and means what he says, and it develops into the group of streams as described with actual country, independent country, and maybe Americana (and Ameripolitan!) channels, I would give it a listen. If he does it and doesn’t screw it up he may redeem himself for some of the multiple reasons people give for not liking him. I would think he could afford to do it independently with his own money and keep it afloat.
June 15, 2023 @ 6:25 pm
He is 100% correct. And this is more true now than it ever was. Country music is all the same and bland. Radio steers the course of any artist’ career success. Iconic artists come out with great music and it is flat-out ignored by radio. Radio is slowly nailing up its coffin as more and more people find more variety through streaming. Artists get more control over their music and publicity through things like social media now and don’t need to be at the record company’s whim.
June 15, 2023 @ 6:38 pm
Years ago I had a meeting with a very famous and lauded Nashville gate keeper. While we were talking, he said, “it’s not about art…radio is not about music, songs are just the things they play between the commercials.” It was sad statement, but one I knew to be true. While I was producing an album project another time, one of the musicians on the session said, “we’re making music in the money business.” And that’s what it is, a business.
June 15, 2023 @ 6:49 pm
Garth is correct, but it’s late Roman decadence sort of correct, the kind expressed by a wealthy palace insider who senses there’s a new emperor in town and stands outside the palace door clucking his tongue. It’s just too pat, and it costs him nothing.
June 15, 2023 @ 7:20 pm
I completely agree with Garth on this:
….”if you don’t play somebody because of the color of their skin or their gender. It’s as equally wrong if you do play somebody because of the color of their skin and their gender. My thing is, let the music decide.”….
Everybody, including Trigger, should let the music decide. Unfortunately, Trigger doesn’t believe in letting the music decide, like Garth does.
June 15, 2023 @ 8:04 pm
He’s following in Bruce Jenner’s footsteps. Garth is already a gaping snatch, but within a decade he’s going to lop off his dong and add a set of fake tits.
June 15, 2023 @ 8:21 pm
Perfect example of how everything these days is taken to some insane extreme. The guy just said he would carry a beer brand in his bar that 90% of other bars carry.
June 15, 2023 @ 8:29 pm
this is usually where you would threaten to shut down the thread because i made fun of this person. not because of what they said.
June 15, 2023 @ 8:43 pm
Well then. Don’t let me lead on that my threats are idle.
June 15, 2023 @ 8:15 pm
You ( need help), be ther asap, I’m a.old man but blew me, t can Southtown part. Or bright new shorel h put shin on it
June 15, 2023 @ 8:44 pm
Comments closed.