Saving Country Music’s Worst Country Songs of 2015
And so continued on the unrelenting march of terrible songs in 2015. This year included some especially diabolical turns that puts the last 12 months in contention for the worst run for songs in country music history. Of course the usual suspects appear on the rap sheet like Luke Bryan, Thomas Rhett, and Sam Hunt. But 2015 ushered in the worst year for watching previously heralded artists (or at least artists that were not that bad), turning their coats from blue to red, and bearing responsibility for the very worst of what 2015 had to offer. Zac Brown Band, Randy Houser, Gary Allan, and even Country Hall of Famers Alabama found the low spots of their entire careers with 2015 single releases.
It was a heartbreaking year to be a country fan as the whole “Metro-Bro” craze spared few, with the only consolation prize being so many of these terrible singles flopped. Here’s the worst songs from 2015, in no particular order.
READ: 2015 Nominees for Saving Country Music’s Song of the Year
Thomas Rhett – “Crash & Burn”
Like Mephistopheles himself gorged on a diet of the most grotesquely valueless souls, and then 36 hours of insidious churning in the innermost bowels of hell amidst unholy gastric juices eventually putrefied a malevolent impaction to be shot out of the Satanic anus like a worm-riddled disease baby, Thomas Rhett has unleashed a new single on the planet called “Crash and Burn.”
May the ghost of the great Sam Cooke kick Thomas Rhett’s ass eternally for ripping off the iconic rhythm and cadence from the classic American standard “Chain Gang” in such an open and arrogant manner that even a villainous bystander like Vanilla Ice would give this the hairy eyeball. “Evolution” in today’s country music is simply a code word for filching something from another genre as the result of the relative vacuum of new ideas in the country medium, and Thomas Rhett and producers Dann Huff and Jesse Frasure left so much of their DNA over the crime scene of this caper it would make a rape kit envious of the swabable masses lingering behind this messy and haphazard ruse. Someone rustle up the bulldog legal team for Marvin Gaye and get them under retainer for the Sam Cooke estate post haste. (read full review)
The Band Perry – “Live Forever”
Goodness, can we just kill off mainstream country music with one final shotgun blast to the noggin instead of watching this long, suffering, painful smothering at the hands of the proprietors of pop who have positively no idea what country music is supposed to be, and are willing to slowly strew its disemboweled innards all across the public sidewalks in victory? Don’t these bastards have any compassion?
“Live Forever” is perfect for a mindless pop crowd who wants to be told when to throw their hands up, when and what to shout during the chorus, and how to act to fit in with everybody else and be cool. “You and I, we’re staying young! We’re gonna live forever!” says the song. Well shit, who doesn’t like that message? The Band Perry have discovered the goddamn Fountain of Youth by golly. Ponce de León, eat your ever-loving conquistador heart out. (read full review)
Zac Brown Band – “Beautiful Drug”
“Beautiful Drug” is not the Zac Brown Band spreading their creative wings. “Beautiful Drug” is not Zac Brown asserting his freedom as an artist. “Beautiful Drug” is not the boys from Georgia “defying genre,” though these excuses and many more will be levied in their defense, and you, YOU the sainted country music and Zac Brown fan will be charged with a treasonous level of closed-mindedness, misunderstanding, and attempts to stifle the evolution of music if you so dare to raise a peep in opposition to Zac Brown finally breaking loose of his corporate bonds to make the music he’s always wanted which in the case of “Beautiful Drug” is apparently hyper-EDM club pop dance music replete with bass drops and the most horrifically prototypical rhythm and structure employed in American pop music in its history. Sam Hunt, eat your ever-loving, Puma-wearing, flat-brimmed country interloping heart out.
There is one thing to take away from “Beautiful Drug” and one thing only: Zac Brown wants your fucking money America. I would label this a sellout moment, but even that seems to slight just what depravity of character the Zac Brown Band evidences by releasing this song, especially as the first track on an album. He might as well have just cued up a mic and screamed “Fuck You!” to start this thing off. Dig deep in those pockets, put your dollars on the table, and nobody gets hurt except the souls of country music fans. It’s time for the Zac Brown Band to get paid mother truckers, so quit your bellyaching and pony the hell up. (read full review)
Bret Michaels – “Girls On Bars”
Well look what the cat dragged in, it’s Bret Michaels from Poison with his Maybelline eyes giving a new definition to the term “coyote ugly” with his caustic and aggressively-unoriginal song “Girls On Bars.” Congratulations country music, your hair metal phase has just graduated from figurative to literal.
He pretty much just released the worst country song ever. It’s not as much sick as it is sad, like it’s a musical illustration of the onset of America’s torpid devolution. Even the video looks like it was made by a bunch of grabasstic high school stoners using 20-year-old deprecated public school media lab equipment rented from the public library as a stop gap solution to a local ISD’s budgetary shortfall. When the camera goes all POV and starts twirling round on the top of a bar, I thought I was suffering from motion sickness. Then I figured out that no, it’s just that this song really really blows to the point of causing debilitating gastrointestinal direst. (read full review)
Uncle Ezra Ray – “B.Y.H.B”
Like a cabal of menacing dark princes rendezvousing in a desert hideout, devoid of any and all compassion and decency as they mastermind a plot to inflict the widest possible psychological toll upon the masses with their incendiary terroristic horror, three semi-successful pop rock washouts refugeed from the implosion of the rock format have conjoined to cobble together whatever is left of their twilighting relevancy and disappearing talent reserves to attempt to prop up their spendthrift lifestyles by releasing the most calamitous and formulaic audio pap to ever be exposed to the human species. Lock your doors and clench your loved ones a little closer: this is the dawning of the unholy triumvirate known as Uncle Ezra Ray.
You can combine all three men’s musical histories together, and most Millennials still wouldn’t know who the fuck these 40-something posers are. But with Mark McGrath’s frosted tips, Kevin Griffin’s co-write of Sugarland’s embarrassing song “Stuck Like Glue,” and Uncle Cracker’s guilty plea for assaulting a woman, these shallow misogynist carpetbaggers should slip right into the dubious ranks of Bro-Country slime balls just dandy. (read full review)
Sam Hunt – “Take Your Time”
Can’t Sam Hunt just move on to being one of those people who is famous for being famous and get bounced out of the third round of Dancing with the Stars or box Tonya Harding on Pay Per View or something? Why does Sam Hunt even exist in anything resembling the country music world? He’s the country music equivalent of a malapropism. “Take Your Time” is the worst song that could have been chosen for Sam Hunt’s second single from and album chock full of bad ideas and boiling over with non-country influences and arrangements.
Some will tell you Sam Hunt and “Take Your Time” is simply country music “evolving,” yet once again the theory of evolution in the minds of country music’s powers that be has to do with dredging up a 30-year-old antiquated and outmoded form of expression in a misguided attempt to pander to the trends of today. Gee I can’t wait until country music’s “evolution” gets to the mid 80’s and country stars are dancing around on stage in spandex onesies with televisions on their heads. (read full review)
Randy Houser – “We Went”
Some bad songs make you angry that such a monstrosity would ever be released under the country banner. Some make you sad for what country music has become. This one? Randy Houser’s entry into this new R&B sexy time Bee Gees-inspired country music disco craze? This thing had me laughing out loud so hard from being so embarrassing and absurd, I had milk shooting out of my nose. And I wasn’t even drinking milk at the time.
To hear the festively plump, bordering on 40-something Randy Houser pseudo-rapping about running from the cops through cornfields with his hot lover had me in stitches to say the least. If you need any more validation that modern country music is nothing more than escapism of the mind for bored suburbanites with shallow understandings of rural life, look no further. Randy Houser could never put enough hair gel and highlights in his 40-year-old’s faux hawk to make this thing seem either respectable or relevant. This songs’s got more pander in it than the Beijing zoo. (read full review)
Jennifer Nettles – “Sugar”
Jennifer Nettles is the Kathy Bates of country music, and I’m not talking the Fried Green Tomatoes Kathy Bates. Where some female performers like to exhibit personas such as the sweet girl next door or the strong Southern Belle, the Sugarland co-singer apparently thinks a psychopathic yandere cross bred with a hyper-spastic oversinger is what will curry the favor of the mindless drones of mainstream country, and get the singer’s solo career the attention it so desperately needs to cling to the dying echoes of a relevant pulse.
What a cacophonous shitbag of embarrassing tastelessness the glucose-fueled “Sugar” aspires to be. Screw the “If you don’t like it, just don’t listen to it” mentality. For the sake of any and all self-dignity, I feel it is an imperative to publicly distance from such an effort as a country music fan, and fervently admonish it to hopefully shelter the innocent from such slipshod efforts and acute mayhem evidenced in this audio and visual abortion. (read full review)
Alabama – “Southern Drawl”
From the “We Will Rock You” intro, to the obnoxious overdriven arena rock guitar, to the awkwardly and uncharacteristically non-synchronous performances by Alabama founding members Randy Owen, Teddy Gentry, and Jeff Cook, “Southern Drawl” isn’t just bad, it’s something that makes you wish you could go back and completely erase it from your country music consciousness lest it run rampant through your memory and sully any rosy regards you had for Alabama’s past accomplishments. Yes, it’s that terrible.
If Maddie & Tae were standing to the side of the stage with their checklist, every square would be marked by the end of “Southern Drawl.” Beer, trucks, backroads, the interjected praising of the troops thrown in it’s all here. Alabama even piped in a crowd cheering for them throughout the track. I mean the hubris of this thing. And listening to these guys trying to emulate the melody-vacant rhythmic pentameter of a modern Bro-Country song is like the country music equivalent of some 60-year-old original-era rappers coming out with clocks around their necks trying to perform modern hip-hop. Word to your mother. Alabama is just completely out of their element, and can barely keep up with the instrument track.
If you needed any more evidence that 2015 is the year of selling out in country music, this is it. Alabama waited 15 years to premier this? (read full review)
Sam Hunt – “House Party”
From an artist who’s consistently offered the most blindingly non-country songs in the entire 70 year history of the genre, “House Party” is Sam Hunt’s most non-country song overall, if you even can believe that’s possible. What about the banjo you ask? That’s the biggest giveaway that this song is nothing more than a calculated ruse. In an absolute vacuum of country influences, Sam Hunt was forced to add the banjo track or risk exposing the song and the entire calculated project for the sham that it is.
The record scratches, the overt use of Auto-tune as an audio filter, the references to “blowing up phones” and “rattling roofs,” and the Ebonic annunciations are enough to not just alarm country fans, but fans of the integrity of culture in all of its forms, especially black artists who are getting sold out by country carpetbaggers that would appropriate and water down everything cool in their culture until there’s nothing left to pilfer in the bankrupting of American culture at large. I would call this the worst country song ever, but even that would endow it with a modicum of potential country music affiliation that it is not qualified to carry. (read full review)
Dishonorable Mention:
” Kelsea Ballerini – “Dibs” (read review)
” Danielle Bradbery – “Friend Zone” (read review)
” Scotty McCreery – “Southern Belle” (read review)
” Eric Paslay – “High Class” (read review)
” Thomas Rhett – “Vacation” (read review)
” Luke Bryan “Kick The Dust Up (read “Why ‘Kick The Dust Up’ Is More Than Just A Bad Song“)
” Cole Swindell “Ain’t Worth The Whiskey” (read review)
” Brett Eldredge “Lose My Mind” (read review)
” Granger Smith “Backroad Song” (read review)
” Kelsea Ballerini “Love Me Like You Mean It” (read review)
” Eli Young Band “Turn It On” (read review)
” Gary Allan “Hangover Tonight” (read review)
December 7, 2015 @ 8:38 am
Dishonorable mention, every time I read that, it cracks me up!
December 7, 2015 @ 8:42 am
Interesting that there’s not one Florida Georgia Line song, or even a mention. Apparently they’re becoming so irrelevant that they aren’t even the whipping boys anymore. So what’s the consensus on where this year stands in relation to the last few? The temptation is to always praise the past and lament the present, but I’m not so sure in this case. The actual songs themselves aren’t as bad as many of their implications (Zac Brown Band and Alabama selling out, Sam Hunt in general, etc.)
In other news, RIP Scott Weiland. He (and presumably others in the bands he worked with) had a healthy appreciation for country music as well as his home genre of rock. Here he is with Velvet Revolver singing an original barroom song, the slightly jokey “Don’t Drop that Dime” – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTWKlKrMR2Y
December 7, 2015 @ 10:30 am
Florida Georgia Line are the only ones whose dumb songs could be considered catchy. They’re some of the dumbest songs you’ll ever have the misfortune of hearing, but at least they actually have a melody to them, unlike a lot of others. FGL’s songs are the ones that get stuck in your head. The only thing FGL knows how to do is make something catchy, but at least they’re good at that.
December 7, 2015 @ 8:42 am
I pretty much can stomach only one of those songs without changing the stations. So, I agree almost whole-heartedly.
December 7, 2015 @ 8:44 am
Guess I should be happy…I’m only vaguely aware of a couple of these songs.
I love what ZBB is capable of, but this didn’t do anything for me.
December 7, 2015 @ 8:45 am
My heart gets ripped out every time I heard beautiful drug.
December 11, 2015 @ 11:18 am
They are so much better than that song. I agree. Makes me almost cry.
December 12, 2015 @ 9:01 pm
Recently saw them in concert. We stayed for more than half and only recognized a couple songs. It was embarrassing to say the least. Between the cover songs, the pot smoke, and EDM 20 somethings dancing around, I can say I’m almost completely done with country music.
December 7, 2015 @ 8:46 am
I clicked play on the B.Y.H.B. song because I hadn’t ever heard of it….Don’t ever click play on the B.Y.H.B. Song! We need warning labels Trigger…Not the kind Doug Stone sang about either. These songs are sad in a whole other meaning.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:00 am
About pissed my pants when I read your comment. Lol
December 7, 2015 @ 3:35 pm
So you’re saying you need a Trigger warning?
* Ba Dum Tss! *
December 7, 2015 @ 8:50 am
I would like to nominate Danielle Bradberry’s Friend Zone. That song makes me want to hurt people. I had not heard that Jennifer Nettles atrocity yet. She is too old to be putting out that pitiful, sad, Disney channel looking shit and her voice makes me want to stick sharp things in my ears.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:59 am
Hideous; I couldn’t even finish that sucker (at least I could handle listening to the Nettles track once, as long as I wasn’t looking at the video). :p
I would also recommend Jana Kramer’s “Said No One Ever” for this list, if only she had released it as a single…
December 7, 2015 @ 8:53 pm
It made me see Christina Aguilara’s future (only she already made her big bucks)
December 7, 2015 @ 8:59 am
I think it narrows down to a three-way tie between Bryan, Swindle, and Rhett, for most offensive song. A lot of these numbers are either just dumb, or just plain not-Country-Music, but those three guys have perfected the art of songs that are more than just dumb: it’s full speed obnoxious.
Luke Bryan used to record stuff like “I Know You’re Gonna Be There” and “You Don’t Know Jack.”
Why doesn’t he do more stuff like that?
As for the other two, I’ve never heard anything even remotely likeable out of them.
December 7, 2015 @ 12:59 pm
I think that’s most people’s complaint with Luke: He used to cut stuff that, while not incredible, was at least decent, and borderline fantastic if you compare it to his current crap
December 7, 2015 @ 9:04 am
What about Sam Hunts “break up in a small town”?
December 7, 2015 @ 9:06 am
That sister c song put me in a decent mood, this just makes me laugh out loud, and the a little sad. This was kind of a bad year. A bunch of those songs did really well on the charts. Bummer
December 7, 2015 @ 9:08 am
If I were a boxer I would use “Dibs” as my entrance music. I think I could punch through a brick wall when she does the talking part with that voice.
December 7, 2015 @ 4:41 pm
Man, you said it.
Kelsea Ballerini is now vying with Sam Hunt for the most the agressively irritating, cringe-inducing “talking” vocal style in history. I’d also say that “Dibs” is the undisputed worst song by a female country artist to chart in 2015, but Jennifer Nettles has made a very strong entry right near the buzzer.
December 7, 2015 @ 4:50 pm
Having said that, I doubt that “sugar” coated piece of crap by Nettles will get any traction.
December 7, 2015 @ 8:51 pm
I don’t even have the heart to care if it does. After what’s gone before, IMO mainstream country music is just DEAD.
December 7, 2015 @ 9:21 am
What criteria is being used to judge these as “worst”? If it’s songs that shouldn’t be classified as country, I can go with that but I don’t think Crash and Burn is a bad song in any other way. A little derivative maybe but I’ve heard dozens worse this year in terms of writing. Kick The Dust Up would be my numero uno and I also think Homegrown Honey and Crushin’ It were lucky to escape being mentioned.
December 7, 2015 @ 9:56 am
I think multiple criteria are being used. There are songs that are objectively bad, and there are songs that are bad because of what they mean for country music from a larger perspective. Then there are songs that are bad because they are obvious, shameless sellouts. I think some of these songs fit at least 2 of these for sure, maybe a couple that hit all three.
Agreed the two songs you mentioned were bad, too. Some of the stuff Brad Paisley puts out is just flat embarrassing, and he should know better.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:44 am
If you walk into a Chinese restaurant, order sweet and sour pork, and get served spaghetti, it doesn’t matter how good that spaghetti is. Judging it as sweet and sour pork, it’s going to be the worst sweet and sour pork you’ve ever eaten.
Yes some of these songs still “work” as songs, but if you compare them with actual R&B and EDM songs, they’re terrible too.
December 7, 2015 @ 9:08 pm
You stole my analogy (sad face)
December 7, 2015 @ 9:33 am
No Old Dominion, I’m presuming because you reviewed the album, not the single. Gosh, the Uncle Ezra Ray, Alabama, and Bret Michaels songs are probably the worst, but they haven’t been impactful. I’d probably give the ultimate dishonor to “Take your Time” and “Crash and Burn” in a tie. While not the worst of this list quality-wise, both were really infectious tunes, really big hits and set a really bad precedent.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:45 am
I’m going to have a worst albums list this year as well. Rest assured, Old Dominion will make an appearance.
December 7, 2015 @ 9:42 am
Also, Trigger, I look forward to your take on the Grammy nominations once you have the chance to digest them.
December 7, 2015 @ 9:47 am
I can’t believe Vacation was not # 1. That is honestly the worst song I have ever heard. Even mainsteam country radio buried it after it being aired for roughly a week.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:47 am
There was no order to this list, but one reason I did not highlight “Vacation” at the top was because it wasn’t released as a single, yet at least. I know that may seem like a silly distinction, but that was the rationale when trying to narrow down the top distinctions to less than 10.
December 7, 2015 @ 9:50 am
By my rough count, the opening rant-line for Uncle Ezra Ray comes in at 94 words. Get that weak sauce outta here!–to come so close to triple digits and just cut it off like that?! Come on, man!!
In other news my guilty bro-mance with Cole Swindell continues, as many see AWtW as coming from a place of misogyny, where I see it as a sour grapes perspective.
YMMV, but I’ve painted many houses in my time and nobody calls me a housepainter. But Cole Swindell sucks one cock . . .
The big loser here of course is Zac Brown Band, based on a large ‘degree of disappointy’ multiplier. Anybody who thinks Alabama’s release is a disappointment doesn’t remember Alabama.
December 7, 2015 @ 9:51 am
Gosh. Can they ALL win?
I was impressed by the inclusion of Jennifer Nettles. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a song in previous worst-of lists that snuck in so late!
December 7, 2015 @ 9:55 am
Other than not being country, “Crash and Burn” isn’t that terrible. I also think “We Went” wasn’t nearly as bad as the others on this list. I think “House Party” deserves the award. I literally thought the song was a joke when I first heard it. I don’t even think the Disney Channel would play it. At least other bad songs are at least bad songs for people who are old enough to drive a car. “House Party” is a horrible song that seems like it’s supposed to be targeted to 12 year olds having a sleep party.
On another note, “Montevello” and “Traveller” are both up for “Country Album of the Year” at the Grammys. The is no fucking chance that anyone could listen to those records back-to-back and say that they are even close to being in the same genre.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:24 am
I honestly thought Sam Hunt’s “Breakup in a Small Town” was a parody. I’ve never even heard the whole thing, just bits and pieces, but it is the absolute most repulsively non-country song I’ve ever heard. That song beats “Ready Set Roll” by for my Worst “Country” Song award.
December 7, 2015 @ 5:40 pm
Before he sold out, Gary Allan once said of bro country, “You used to be able to turn on the radio and you knew instantly it was the country station just by listening to it, and now you”™ve got to leave it there for a second to figure it out.” After hearing Sam hunt’s latest hate crime, I think I’d have to revise that statement. If you turn on the radio and you hear “Breakup”, You have to leave it there for a second, and then another second, and then another, and then jiggle the dial around a little bit to make sure you’re on the right station, and then you start to wonder if they’ve switched formats to pop, not that it matters since there are two other country stations in your city and they both play the exact same music, and then the song ends and you hear the lunkheaded DJ, “HOTTEST COUNTRY HITS, NUMBER ONE FOR NEW COUNTRY MUSIC!”, he says, and you begin to scream. That song has nothing, and I mean nothing, to do with country At all. With Hunt’s previous songs you could tell that he was at least pretending to be country by putting in a token banjo, a vaguely country-sounding instrumentation, or an etherial Southern twang, but now he knows that he doesn’t need to make that effort, that stations will play whatever slop he gives them, no matter how little resemblance it bares to country.
December 7, 2015 @ 2:53 pm
Yeah, Crash and Burn is catchy, inoffensive and enthusiastically sung. Definitely one of the less bad things on country radio.
December 7, 2015 @ 5:34 pm
Personally, “House Party” irritates me somewhat less than Sam Hunt’s other recent singles, specifically because he’s not doing the pseudo rap talk-singing shtick he usually does. There’s something incredibly smarmy about Sam Hunt’s entire persona, but he’s at his absolute worst when he’s trying to oscillate between half-rapping and half-singing like his hero, Drake. Good lord. (His mugging in the music video is absolutely insufferable, though.) in my estimation, “House Party” is a passable, silly pop song.
I agree that “Take Your Time” sounds like unintentional self-parody. That song is a dang joke.
As for Hunt’s music being aimed at 12 year olds, I agree that nothing he has released so far has shown any kind of maturity. You know, Hunt kinda reminds me of Bobby Bones for some reason. I wonder if they each other’s flatbill caps.
Finally, what any of these songs is doing on a radio station labeled “country” is beyond me.
December 7, 2015 @ 5:41 pm
*I wonder if they borrow each other’s flat bill caps
December 7, 2015 @ 7:51 pm
Sam Hunt is awesome. Very talented, easy going, great guy. I love all of his music. HOWEVER, it is NOT country music. I can easily listen to Chris Stapleton, and then switch to Sam Hunt. I have Chris’s album right here in front of me. Music is turning into one huge mono-genre, just like all smaller stores/corporations are being bought out by bigger corporations and eventually there will only be Walmart to shop at. The world is going to hell, and so is music and everything else….so it’s best if yall get used to hardcore-pop-leaning artists like Sam Hunt being on country radio. Hell even Justin Timberlake is coming to country music, hes been a pop artist since day 1.
December 7, 2015 @ 9:47 pm
Not to argue with your personal taste, but your selling point for Sam Hunt’s music is, “the world is going to hell, and so is music and everything else” … might as well accept Sam Hunt?
Not exactly a strong pitch!
December 8, 2015 @ 8:43 am
No that is not what i’m getting at. Some on here are saying he’s terrible and his music sucks. To someone who is a hardcore country fan, I could only imagine that one would have such an opinion. Me, I love country old and new and I also enjoy other genres. Sam can sing there is no doubt, he also has a good voice, good lyrics with catchy melodies, and strong production. IMO hes a likeable guy, coming from someone who hates almost everyone. im not really trying to argue or make arguing points. im just trying to state hes not the terrible artist with bad music that everyone seems to be saying, his music is just not country its that plain and simple.
December 14, 2015 @ 8:34 pm
Just saw this, I’m going to disagree. I really think he has a very average voice relative to people on country radio and on pop radio. Artists like Adele, Carrie Underwood, and even Bruno Mars have great voices. Sam Hunt’s doesn’t sound anything special. I don’t think I would have an opinion on him either way if I heard him on pop radio.
But, he’s marketing his music as country, which makes me hates his guts. Not that that is a legitimate reason to dislike someone though.
December 9, 2015 @ 7:54 am
I for one am well-accustomed to shitty terrestrial radio–in all genres.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:11 am
The first 2 times I heard Beautiful Drug, I thought the radio station was doing some sort of weird cross-promotion with another station in their group (it’s an iHeart station) and playing some dance club song or re-mix of a song. Hideous, just hideous and has no place on any country radio station. Shame on you programmers!
December 7, 2015 @ 10:20 am
I agree with 99% of what Trigger says, but I still don’t see the mysogyny of “Ain’t Worth the Whiskey.” Whether he’s distressed, angry, or playing mind games with her, I say I guy has a right to do that or feel that way. Except for guys like Cole, I guess. It’s not a good song by any means, but it’s way less offensive than the other songs these bros sing. People don’t hate the song because of its content, they hate it because of who sings it. Cole sings the song, so people assume it must be mysogynistic. I’m sorry, but I don’t think that particular song is nearly as bad as these others.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:38 am
I honestly have to agree with you. I scoured that review trying to find the piece I was missing, half expecting Misogyny to jump out like Freddy Fazbear when I least expected it…
I think by and large Cole Swindle’s material isn’t particularly respectful of women, but he’s “misogyny light” whereas Luke Bryan and Thomas Rhett offer up the stuff in heavier doses.
Cole Swindle is also totally and completely one-dimensional, I haven’t seen anything even remotely resembling personality or character from him. He is so shallow he’s almost mechanical, both the way he acts and his music… He’s like ramen noodles without the flavor packet.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:43 am
I hate the song for its content! 😉
It definitely struck me as misogynistic in both his tone as well as cheapening her worth to less than that of whiskey.
December 7, 2015 @ 11:57 am
Maybe she done him wrong. Have you ever said anybody isn’t worth something because you were mad? He could’ve just as easily been saying that about a man. He’s saying he’s mad at the girl and she’s not worth getting upset over. That’s it. If Wade Bowen or Aaron Watson had sang that exact song, I guarantee it would be considered a good song. Trigger would write a positive review about it. It’s bias, plain and simple.
December 7, 2015 @ 1:45 pm
Don’t know about all that Kale. We can argue if it’s misogynist or not, and I respect your perspective on that. But either way I don’t know if it warrants a positive review, at least from me.
December 7, 2015 @ 2:43 pm
Yeah, I don’t think the song is particularly misogynistic (I think it’s an unreliable narrator deal), but it also isn’t particularly good.
Although better production and competent (and interpretive) singing might elevate it into something worth listening to.
December 7, 2015 @ 4:09 pm
Well at least he didn’t make a “humorous” song about murdering her and everyone thinks it’s just uproarious that she’s missing, except that no one misses her, and everybody’s dancing to the hilarious song about murdering a man and no one bothers to seek justice for him. Because that wouldn’t be misandrist at all, you know.
Trigger, it’s a public service that you listen to all this crud so that the rest of us don’t have to. At the rate it’s going, I’ll wind up being a musical Miss Havisham, because I just don’t even want to give any of it a chance. Heck, Alison Krauss is still a “new artist” to me.
December 8, 2015 @ 2:18 pm
Yeah, I always took the song as a man who is trying to pretend that she doesn’t mean anything to him, but the reality is that she was his world and a false face is his way of coping. Sort of like “Cold One.” The man in that song is devastated by her departure, but he pretends to focus on her taking the beer as his main gripe. I wouldn’t categorized either song as misogynic. They are just songs about a man done wrong and he isn’t thinking rationally. I am sure if they had time to cool down their thought process would be nicer to the ladies, but grief can cause upsetting thoughts.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:27 am
Trigger, i think there’s a big misunderstood with ZBB’s Beautiful drug and their whole album. Im not a ZB’s fan boy, i dont even call their music country, country music is Merle, Waylon and co., i could call em at last pop country, or alt. Country if it does even exist. Never brown claimed to be a country singer, they dont push to be on country radios, country radios push em to get em because usually its a big hit coming. I enjoy country, rock, metal, even sometimes EDM music at times i must admit. The fact is you re a country music website and beautiful drugs isnt a country single at all. ZBB is like coldplay if you allow to to compare em, some folky songs, some stadium songs, some pop, some EDM… when you put a ZBB album you know you will have some caribean tunes, some southern rock, some folk songs, some soul songs, some pop songs, and i m even talking about pre-jekyl+hyde era, not now. Brown never wear cowboy hat and boots, always recorded what he loved. He tried something new with beautiful drug, but he recorded a whole ep with dave grohl, and never peope complained abut it, and yu cant say brown and the foo fighters music are similar. He wont make a whole EDM album he did his things with Avincii, good for him i dnt like it, but why shuld he be stucks in a case but its nt cuntry music? Yu shouldnt even write about it, its not a cuntry song. Brown never made an album a la ACdc with the same recrds for 25 year! Who said they were country btw ? Brown commented about luke bryan and the state f country music? Yes, but he didnt say he labeled himself as country singer, he said he was sad to be classified as the same label as this shit! I prefer zac brown as luke bryan pretending to be country!
December 7, 2015 @ 10:54 am
“Beautiful Drug” was released to country music radio as a country music single on September 21st. It wasn’t released to pop radio as a pop single. That is why it is being considered as a country song. I remember when the album first came out, there were tons of assurances that “Beautiful Drug” would NOT be released as a country single. And then it was.
Also interesting to note that it has really struggled at country radio. It got to #20, and then stalled. Bad mistake by Zac Brown Band. If you’re going to release a song like that to country, it better go Top 5, if not hit #1. Not even getting to the Top 10 means the backlash was bigger than the push for a song like that.
December 7, 2015 @ 11:06 am
If i remember Brown claimed he never looked to be aired on country radio. Country radio aired this song because everyone use to label zbb country and because they have an history of biv hits on country radio.
December 7, 2015 @ 1:58 pm
Not true. Big Machine posted specific ads for “Beautiful Drug” geared towards country radio in trade magazines like “Country Aircheck” and “Billboard Country Update.” To release a single takes a big budgetary expenditure and advertising. This song was very specifically targeted to country radio, they didn’t just pick it up on their own volition.
December 7, 2015 @ 12:20 pm
My problem with Beautiful Drug isn’t that it exists, but that it was released to country radio. I don’t think it’s very good even by pop standards, but he can make whatever music he wants. Trouble is, after his big statement about “That’s My Kind of Night” being the worst thing ever, him coming out with something like Beautiful Drug makes him seem like a big ol hypocrite. As a fan, it kinda feels like a betrayal. Like, who can you trust?
I LIKE that they’re not strictly a country band and can branch out with stuff like The Grohl sessions and Heavy is the Head. But Beautiful Drug is not something that’s going to appeal to much of their fanbase. Whether it’s country, rock, southern rock, whatever, ZBB appeals to those who want live, organic music, a full band sound. NOT EDM with a sterile beat and weird echoey effects and stale cliches. That shows they’re trying to court a different fanbase, the trendy pop crowd. Cause I guess they don’t have enough money already *eyeroll* And that’s what worries me. Beautiful Drug is not the sound of artistic experimentation, it’s the sound of shallow cynicism.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:21 pm
Still, beautiful drugs has nothing to do on “country songs list” . Whatever how you label it and on which radio station it is aired, its not country music, period. In europe beautiful drugs is aired on mainstream radio, and mostly alt. rock radio.
December 7, 2015 @ 4:20 pm
Country if it does even exist.
That’s all that needs to be said, right there. Mainstream country music is dead, dead, dead. I have never witnessed such a concerted effort to kill a genre of music in history, unless you count “Disco Demolition Day”, which didn’t really kill disco, it just went sub and turned into dance music. Even the death of rock looks like an organic death compared to the obvious murder of mainstream country music. The question for which I have no answer (but a few theories) is ‘Why?”
Oh, and I should have said that to me, Gillian Welch is a new artist. Even I knew Alison Krauss had been around for a while, and at least she’s stayed true to bluegrass and country while “evolving”, Now that’s how music is “evolved”, what’s happening to country is plain murder.
December 9, 2015 @ 8:19 am
‘the death of rock looks like an organic death compared to the obvious murder of mainstream country music.’
Well said.
I don’t think MCM was murdered, though. It is gimped up in leather in a box in the basement of music row. They have to tie you to a chair to look at it, too. Ball gag mandatory for all non-bloggers.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:34 am
ZBB’s album was released as country. That makes it a problem.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:36 am
Why didn’t this go to Vlaanderen?
December 7, 2015 @ 10:53 am
Check out how they plai beautiful drug live, its one of the coolest song of the show, totally different, you could call em sellout if dj’s and david guetta would be on stage with them!
December 7, 2015 @ 10:46 am
Who said so? Find me a quote where brown is saying irs a country album?
December 7, 2015 @ 12:00 pm
Beautiful Drug IS being played on country radio, so ZBB’s people must be pushing it to country radio – how else would it get there? It doesn’t matter what the band feels “artistically”, they’re going along with it. If the ZBB objected to this being marketed as a country album, I suppose they could buy the album back from their record company and release it themselves, like Wilco did with Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (though for different reasons) and I don’t see that happening. Regardless of any of that, Beautiful Drug just isn’t a very good song, in any genre.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:39 am
Eh, I still can’t get all that worked up over Randy House’s “We Went” compared to all the others. Its sin is being so paint-by-numbers more than anything.
And “Live Forever” only deserves to be here because it was aggressively marketed as a “country song”. On its own, though, it’s a decent pop song.
I’m typing on my phone and am busy with holiday volunteerism, so I’ll offer my Worst Ten Country/”Country” Singles of 2015 and Twenty Worst Country Songs of 2015 lists later. But off the top of my head, here are some tracks I believe are even worse than some of the names listed here:
*
Haley Georgia: “Ridiculous” (she will definitely top my year-end worst list)
David Fanning: “Doin’ Country Right”
Thomas Rhett: “South Side”
Luke Bryan: “Move”
Olivia Lane: “You Part 2”
Canaan Smith: “Stuck” and “Two Lane Road”
RaeLynn: “Better Do It” and “Boyfriend”
Chris Lane: “Fix”
Dallas Smith: “Kids With Cars”
Tyler Farr: “C.O.U.N.T.R.Y.”
Old Dominion: (Most Anything)
*
December 7, 2015 @ 11:46 am
Pretty good list there, Nadia, especially those first two. I really can’t decide which of those two would be worse, of the songs OR the “artists” themselves. I mean, on one hand, you have Haley Georgia saying she wants to be “country music’s Ke$ha,” and on the other hand you have David Fanning saying ““I didn”™t have a favorite country CD that I listened to all day long…I was listening to country radio.” I’m just like, damn, brutha, don’t believe I’da told that.
December 7, 2015 @ 11:55 am
To me, Haley Georgia takes the cake because of how desperately she and EMI flailed in the mind-boggling #Redic PR campaign.
Old Dominion have, by far, the most consistently terrible collection of tracks on a single album. “Nowhere Fast” was the only track that, upon listen, strick me as undeserving of association with the rest of the year’s worst. It isn’t a good song either, but just painfully average. Virtually the rest of “Meat & Candy” consists of tracks you could take your pick from and decide which ones to include in a Year-End Worst List. It’s THAT bad.
December 8, 2015 @ 8:52 am
Old Dominion us the most generic, worst, most un-country band/artist in country music. Garbage.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:40 am
Jake Owen “Real Life” and Chase Rice “Gonna Wanna Tonight” both on the bad list. Do you think “honey I’m good’ Be on your list too? Smokin & drinkin’ , and “little red wagon” Miranda Lambert both are pretty bad too.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:45 am
Old Dominion anybody?
December 7, 2015 @ 10:55 am
I would add
Little Red Wagon
Breakup in a Small Town
Danielle Bradberry’s Friendzone
(Anything by) Old Dominion
(Anything related to) Blake Shelton
and this week’s #1 Dan+Shay.
December 7, 2015 @ 7:49 pm
When did the name of Gunpowder and Lead change to Little Red Wagon? Oh wait, didn’t it change to White Liar at one point? Baggage Claim?
Miranda Lambert, universally loved despite rehashing the same song for years with a handful of decent singles scattered around them.
December 8, 2015 @ 8:17 pm
I don’t see the similarity between Gunpowder and Lead, Little Red Wagon or White Liar. I liked White Liar, at the time it was released it is was refreshing to here, its just way overplayed even to this day.
Baggage Claim is the only one I can see even a resemblance to production wise, by the song not having a story or any real substance. LRW just didn’t make since at all, at least BC you could understand. Though BC not a favorite of mine but if you see it live fans love it, but Little Red Wagon was hated by almost everyone even some of her fan pages dissed that as a single choice. Plus she didn’t even write Little Red Wagon.
December 10, 2015 @ 10:19 pm
It’s more about the thematic material than the sonic elements. I’m tired of her “he was mean to mean so I’m going to bitch for 3 and half minutes” songs.
December 10, 2015 @ 12:56 pm
EXACTLY!
She is no different than the bros who rehash the same shit, yet even here on SCM everybody’s bowing and scraping before everything she does.
her Pistol Annies work, however, remains brilliant.
December 7, 2015 @ 11:03 am
“Like Mephistopheles himself gorged on a diet of the most grotesquely valueless souls, and then 36 hours of insidious churning in the innermost bowels of hell amidst unholy gastric juices eventually putrefied a malevolent impaction to be shot out of the Satanic anus like a worm-riddled disease baby…”
This still makes me giggle. 😀
Out of all these (including Dishonorable Mentions), I’ve probably only listened to Granger Smith, Jennifer Nettles, ZBB and possibly the Band Perry ones all the way through. :p
December 7, 2015 @ 11:12 am
Good list, or rather, terrible list. What a dull slog of a year. Crash and Burn kind of pales in comparison to the other atrocities for me, it’s okay as a pop song at least. It probably deserves inclusion just for shamelessly ripping off Chain Gang.
My worst list was pop and country, not that there’s much difference, but these were my country picks. (Hits only, so no Band Perry,etc.)
8. A mashup of the identical metro/bro/pop crap “Gonna Know We Wanna Make Tonight Look Good on You… Girl” – Jason Thomas Chase Rice Rhett Bob Johnson Shelton (I deemed Cole Swindell too dull to even make my worst list. Not that any of this is interesting either.)
6. tie – House Party and Breakup in a Small Town – Sam Hunt
4. Sun Daze – FGL (released last year, but still high on the charts in 2015… sigh. I know where I’d like to stick that pink umbrella.)
3. Kick the Dust Up – Luke Bryan (stupidest and most ugly, unlistenable “country” hit of the year. hateithateithateit grrrrr)
Dishonorable mentions: Homegrown Honey, Buy Me a Boat
Goodbye 2015. I hope next year isn’t somehow worse.
December 7, 2015 @ 11:45 am
And “Uncle Ezra Ray,” good Lord. Terrible late 90s pop-rock meets terrible bro-country, it’s like a three-headed beast from my darkest nightmares. *shudder*
December 7, 2015 @ 6:00 pm
4. Sun Daze ”“ FGL (released last year, but still high on the charts in 2015”¦ sigh. I know where I”™d like to stick that pink umbrella.)
LOL, Melissa.
December 7, 2015 @ 11:21 am
Why are “worst of” lists so much more fun than “best of” lists? This whole article is hilarious, with my personal favorite lines being “I had milk shooting out of my nose. And I wasn”™t even drinking milk at the time.”
December 7, 2015 @ 11:46 am
“Why are “worst of” lists so much more fun than “best of” lists”
Ranting is cathartic. It feels good to slay the beast. 🙂
December 7, 2015 @ 1:49 pm
The fact that much of Saving Country Music’s positive coverage is virtually ignored while everything else goes viral, especially on Facebook, lends to the misconception that all I do is negative stuff, and that I don’t “support the music.” I agree these lists can be fun and that’s why I post them. But I I wish the positive ones would at least get equal recognition.
December 7, 2015 @ 5:56 pm
Trigger, I bet that you meant that you wouldn’t be lying 🙂
December 7, 2015 @ 12:34 pm
I’m laughing like crazy at the article and the comments. I’m going back shortly to rewatch all of these horrible videos to laugh at them, too.
December 7, 2015 @ 11:33 am
With the exception of maybe 3 or 4 including the Dishonorable Mentions, this is actually the most I’ve ever agreed with this list. My only wish list item would be for Chris Lane’s Fix EP to be on any Worst of 2015 list because it is the absolute worst thing thats ever passed through my eardrums.
December 7, 2015 @ 11:50 am
Yep, I made sure to cite “Fix” in my list! 😉
December 7, 2015 @ 12:09 pm
Oh you did. Thank you Nadia. Thank you lol.
December 7, 2015 @ 12:40 pm
The correct answer is K. all of the above.
Of course, I would add Kick the Dust Up to the list and then vote it to the top. Worse “country” song ever. Also wins for worst lyrics.
December 7, 2015 @ 12:42 pm
I love how Eric Paslay made it on the Best and the Worst lol. Thats an accomplishment.
December 7, 2015 @ 12:42 pm
The list is near-flawless Trigger .Only thing worse than ZBB’s song above year was Zak’s carnival barker-like attire and ‘performance” on last night’s Sinatra birthday show .Can you say AWKWARD . Man ….I swear he must have been forced at gunpoint to get out on that stage with the likes of Harry Connick , Celine Dion and John Legend and imitate Frank .WTF ?
In fact , with the exception of Trisha Yearwood ,ALL of the ” country ” acts , including Carrie Underwood , were just wrong wrong wrong …fish out of water , in over their heads, awkward vocally and visually . You can add Adam Levine to that list too. Just foolishly out of their respective elements ….all of them .What a desperate grasp at exposure for those otherwise successful people .
December 7, 2015 @ 5:59 pm
I didn’t even see it and those particular people singing Old Blue Eyes’ songs doesn’t make any sense to me.
December 7, 2015 @ 7:15 pm
I agree with Melanie. I didn’t catch that event, but I’m not sure what any of those particular performers would have any credibility interpreting Sinatrs. Hey, didn’t Bob Dylan release an album of Sinatrs covers this year?
Anyway, the John Lennon 75th birthday that’s coming up on AMC later this month looks like slightly more promising. I saw this pic pop up on social media recently:
https://mobile.twitter.com/BlackbirdProd/status/673335863137476608
🙂
December 8, 2015 @ 6:45 am
Let’s just pray that they overlook paying “tribute” in this way to Bing Cosby and Fred Astaire. In fact, I may go off on anyone who messes with Mr Astaire like
this, because I admit it-I’m a major fan girl of his singing as well as his dancing.
December 8, 2015 @ 7:29 am
I think Bob Dylan does indeed have an affinity for that style of music. I remember a story from his Chronicles Volume 1 book about going to see a Frank Sinatra Jr. show in the 60’s and having a talk with Frank Jr., who was very suspicious of him. In the story, Bob wins him over with his knowledge of that genre. Then again, who knows how accurate the story is? 😉
December 8, 2015 @ 9:21 am
Dylan is one of the few I’d give a pass, for many reasons-he’s of an age to have grown up with Sinatra in Sinatra’s heyday and therefore really understand him, and Dylan has always been idiosyncratic enough to get away with a lot. Also, he’s one of the few of whom it can truly be said that he’s an original, whether you like his stuff or no, merely by having the luck to come of age before everything had already been done. And he must be the first guy in history ( unless you count Jimmy Durante) who didn’t have a “voice” yet he could sing, if you know what I mean.
December 8, 2015 @ 10:04 am
I know exactly what you mean. And I agree. When someone says that Dylan and others “can’t sing,” (or maybe more accurately, “could never sing,” as Dylan’s latest album of originals Tempest can be a bit of a challenge to listen to all the way through), I will always roll my eyes.
December 7, 2015 @ 1:06 pm
My favorite part of this list? I have never even heard of, much less heard, most of these songs by God’s good grace, and plan on steering way clear of all of them like a bad case of gonorrhea. Thank goodness we live in an age where the only option isn’t the radio’s version of country music.
December 7, 2015 @ 8:49 pm
I just had to be masochistic and hit ‘play” on that “Sugar” video-I watched less than a minute of it and was ready to gouge my eyes out with a spoon and stick icepicks in my ears. Things are worse than I thought, because for some years I have refused to listen to country radio (and God forbid I would watch the stupid videos), and I already thought things were really bad-country music as a mainstream genre is dead dead dead.
I mean, from Hank Williams, George Jones, Tammy Wynette, and Loretta Lynn to THIS crud?!
December 7, 2015 @ 2:30 pm
And any off the tractor rappers
December 7, 2015 @ 2:54 pm
You didn’t even mention Danielle Bradbury’s song ‘Friend zone.’ You seemed to be biased towards the Voice and against Idol(always hating on Scotty).
December 7, 2015 @ 6:34 pm
There, I just added Danielle’s “Friend Zone” to the list. That way all of her fans can be pissed off at me too. 🙂
December 7, 2015 @ 3:06 pm
I feel like you have always been biased against Scotty McCreery just because he came from American Idol and didn’t “pay his dues.” Guess what, your special snowflake Kasey Musgraves did the same thing, only she went on a different show. You also didn’t accuse her of “selling out” when she went on tour with pop singer Katy Perry.
December 7, 2015 @ 3:19 pm
Firstly, “American Idol” has nothing to do with my condemnation of a handful of McCreery’s single releases. It’s the fact he has demonstrated he is capable of quality and has a strong voice but wastes it on some of the most cynically disposable and shamelessly corporate trends. He has proven he’s capable of solid album tracks and live performances, but squanders his career development on insipid singles like “Southern Belle” and “Feelin’ It”.
Secondly, as anyone who has followed me here knows all too well, I have been outspokenly critical of Kacey Musgraves compared to most here. Her debut album was among the most critically overrated albums I’ve ever reviewed, and I gave “Biscuits”, “Follow Your Arrow” and “Keep It To Yourself” mediocre reviews. So no double standard here when it comes to reality television show-related entertainers.
December 7, 2015 @ 3:30 pm
I don’t know if you are trigger or not (using another name?), but he has always hated on Scotty, yet praised praised The Voice contestants like Craig Wayne Boyd and Jake Worthington. If its because they are traditional, then where was your support for country Idol singer Janelle Arthur back in 2013? Or Skylar Laine in 2012? Especially when the Voice is the epitome of being ANTI-traditional country music. Look what it turned Blake Shelton into. Look what happened to Danielle Bradbery. And look how they turned a non-country singer(Cassadee Pope) into a “country” singer.
December 7, 2015 @ 4:44 pm
You can ask Trigger that! I reside in a completely different climate zone in a completely different state in a completely different time zone than him! ^__^
Just felt the need to immediately respond to your initial point about why McCreery has received his share of unflattering scrutiny here. But you raise solid points otherwise.
December 7, 2015 @ 6:08 pm
Good grief, projecting much?
December 7, 2015 @ 6:17 pm
First off, Nadia is not me (though you’re not the first to accuse such). Also, I was pretty unforgiving of Craig Wayne Boyd’s first single. I don’t review artists, I review songs and albums. I thought Jake Worthington’s album was decent. I slammed Danielle Bradbury’s “Friend Zone” because it sucked. I’m not sure what you’re getting at here but the only pattern I’m tracing is calling music like I see it. I’m not sure what any of them being on “The Voice” has to do with anything. I don’t watch the show. I know it exists and have watched certain episodes, but it in no way influences my opinions.
December 7, 2015 @ 6:05 pm
I’ve never even see Kacy Musgrave on teevee, or heard her sing, she’s no special snowflake of mine for other reasons. Sheesh, you fanboys and fangirls, it’s kind of adorable the way you get indignant if even one person in the whole world doesn’t just worship your idols. Would it almost kill you to know that there are probably people in places like Nepal or the deepest Amazon who have never even heard of Scott McCreery and will somehow survive in spite of it?
December 7, 2015 @ 6:30 pm
Why, because I buried one of Scotty McCreery’s songs at the bottom of this list? If there was a bias here, how about the dude I included two of his songs at the very top. You don’t see any Sam Hunt fans around here crying. I’m bias against bad music, and people who don’t stay true to themselves. That’s why I criticized “Southern Belle.”
December 7, 2015 @ 7:23 pm
My reply was to McCreery’s fanboy. I don’t know anything about any of these people’s music, and from what I read, I’m not missing anything, as a fangirl of traditional and classic country music 🙂
December 7, 2015 @ 3:12 pm
I really like Scotty’s “Southern Belle” but on my dislike list.
Old Dominion “Break up with him”
Sam Hunt 3 singles
Cole Swindell last 2 singles
Daniele Bradbury “Friend Zone”
Miranda Lambert “Little Red Wagon”, Smokin and Drinkin'”
Luke Bryan’s last 4 singles
Jason Aldean “last 12 singles sounds alike”
FGL last 4 singles except “Dirt”
Jake Owen Real Life
I really like Randy Houser “We Went”
December 7, 2015 @ 5:36 pm
I don’t know if I want to start punching or crying.
December 7, 2015 @ 6:10 pm
I’m at the resigned laughter stage, country music as a mainstream genre is dead, dead, dead.
December 7, 2015 @ 6:14 pm
I like “House Party” but you’re right. It’s not country. I also like Houser’s “We Went”. Have you heard Kenny Chesney’s “Beercan Chicken”? That was cringe worthy! So is “Pass me a Copperhead”, which is on his latest album. That one is so bad, I didn’t bother trying to listen to the rest! These a and Luke Bryan and others are what made me switch the dial from country to oldies. I’m only 44! I listen to Bee Gees and just whatever is on the oldies stations that appeals to me, or I simply turn off the radio. I didn’t do that, before. Now, I rarely turn it on! I miss music! So, I enjoy Barry, Robin, and Maurice. At least they wrote and sang some great music (IMHO). Hell, Barry can still sing circles around these guys, and I happen to love KC! Sick of Tim, don’t like Luke anymore (with his big mouth), Jason Aldean (every song has the same damned melody), or FGL, Sam Hunt, et al…I’m pretty much done with country music. Kenny is trying so hard to stay relevant, it’s heart breaking. Luke can’t keep his mouth shut, Aldean…don’t get me started…UGH!
I’ll just stick with the Bee Gees…at least they didn’t shake their asses, or try to be something they werent(except in the movie Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band).
December 8, 2015 @ 12:37 pm
Jen, I’m with you-I don’t care what anyone says, I like the BeeGees just fine-at least they could carry a tune and excelled at harmony (brother acts tend to do that, in my experience).
Regarding country-I still listen to country-but that means stuff you’ll never hear again on the radio, unless you’re fortunate enough to have a “classic country” station in your listening area, and by “classic country” I mean the pre-Garth and Shania era (heck, if I want to be a hardazz about it, I mean the pre-Dolly and Kenny Rogers duet era). The Louvin Brothers and Jean Shepard are as relevant in my life as they were at the peak of their fame.
Now, if you mean the stuff they call “country”, or “hot country” or “nu-country” or whatever title they’ve come up with this week to try to trick someone into thinking this is country music, then like you, I don’t listen to country anymore (All rules have their exceptions, and my rules have theirs-Alison Krauss, Gillian Welch, are two of them. And I can’t imagine that Ricky Skaggs has it in him to make any music that I couldn’t call “country” according to my lights, unless it’s gospel music or bluegrass, and those are just peachy by me too 🙂 )
December 7, 2015 @ 7:50 pm
I don’t hate Take Your Time. I’ve said that before, but I’ll reiterate it. I think it’s easily the best of his 4 singles, the one time that what he tried to do actually worked, even if it isn’t a country song. I love the guitar/piano combination in the verses. It’s just haunting. I don’t know how or why, but I can’t hate that song along with everybody.
December 7, 2015 @ 9:32 pm
I don’t mind Take Your Time or Leave the Night On. I was actually okay with Sam Hunt at first, not as a country artist but as an artist. Then the next two songs happened.
December 7, 2015 @ 8:10 pm
Thankfully I’m only vaguely familiar with most of these shitburgers, however there is one on this list that I must pontificate on. Oh yes, there is one song on this list that has seemed to leach its way into my thoughts to the point where I have found it dancing around the tip of my tongue (one time I caught my self almost humming it and I immediately washed my mouth out with soap). The song I’m talking about belongs to none other than that flat-brim hat wearing non-country, stupid haircutted sumbitch Sam “the sham” Hunt. “It’s a house paaawwwty we don need no-bawwwdy”- goddamn auditory sexual assault if you ask me. Worst fucking song ever. Every time I hear this cow fart I envision running up and booting Mr. Hunt square in the taint with the force of an NFL place kicker. Well now ya got my vote. Whew! That felt good!
December 7, 2015 @ 8:13 pm
My thoughts on this list overall is that, there are probably several songs here that didn’t even make the top ten, and some that didn’t crack the list at all, that up to a couple years ago would have been considered as being in the running for the worst song of the year, and arguably among the worst of all time. Is that hyperbole? It would be really interesting to see a revised “Worst of All Time” list at this point. Would a song like “Red Solo Cup” even make the list anymore at this point? Wasn’t there once a time when serious country music fans considered “Achy Breaky Heart” one of the dumbest songs are ever? Now that seems almost quaint.
One point I would like to make about country radio though is that, recently when I’ve occasionally (and breifly) flipped on 97.9 just to torture myself, I have noticed a couple changes, the presence of Chris Stapleton aside. For one, there seems to be quite a bit more music by women. As far as I can tell, they play that song “Burning House” by Cam a lot, which is a slow, abstract, accoustic ballad by a female artist, which seems like the kind of thing mainstream radio wouldn’t have wanted to touch with stainless steel songs even a year or so ago. (Although, I still don’t think it’s country per se.)
Also, this may be my imagination, but they seem to playing more older, recurrent tracks; a couple times in the last couple weeks I have flipped on the station and they’ve been playing Keith Urban’s song “Somebody Like You” and another Tim McGraw song I recognized from a decade or so ago. I don’t remember them playing that kind of stuff during the height of bro-country. I won’t say whether thing are improving, but it seems that the overlords of country radio are tinkering with the formula.
December 7, 2015 @ 8:20 pm
“Stainless steel tongs,” even.
December 7, 2015 @ 8:28 pm
That Randy Houser video-“We Went”-didn’t Damn Yankees do that already in 1990? No remake of that video could ever outcool Ted Nugent nonchalantly chewing gum (or maybe chaw) while he puts out on his guitar. But then not many humans can outcool Ted Nugent, period.
December 7, 2015 @ 8:35 pm
Now that I think of it, it’s funny-a lot of these videos look like rehashes of what was done first, and better (“better” being relative) in the Eighties. Professional career women who are dressed all buttoned up being led to unbutton by all the grooviness of the lead singer (ZZ Top and at least a dozen others), a woman dressed in weird, wanna-be provocative get-up (Madonna?),women dancing all over the tables in dive bar (Hurts So Good)-I could probably remember more if I tried. Sounds like some producer or someone wants to relive their glory days in the Eighties. Can’t wait for the “country music” video where two Miami cops who don’t wear socks chase the bad guys in a Ferrari Daytona Spider.
December 7, 2015 @ 10:45 pm
There should be a warning: watch/listen to any of these videos and you’ll never get those minutes back unless you can time travel.
I’d like to imagine The Nerd (of Angry Video Game Nerd) “reviewing” some of these songs:
“House Party by Sam Hunt. More like House Potty because this song is shit!”
If I could add any song to this list, but I won’t link to it because I’m not giving it any YouTube hits, is Dean Brody’s “Bring Down The House.” It is seriously as bad as anything on this list. It’s trash. Like, these are actual lyrics written by a human being. Maybe.
“I’m wearing camo, y’all hashtag this
This party’s raging, you won’t wanna miss
All my buddies turning up, parking lot is full of trucks
Hang on tight, hang on tight, oh my, my, my
And I say “Hey, I, want you girl”
You make my heart, heart flutter like a tilt-a-whirl
It’s getting freaky on the floor feel that rumbling sound
I might have grown up in a barn
But I can bring down the house”
I think Americans were exempt from hearing this bro-tastic EDM shit fest.
December 8, 2015 @ 6:27 am
“You too can be a country music songwriter! For a limited time, we’re offering all the secrets of writing country western lyrics, all for the special low price of $99.99-that’s a savings of $49.99-but only if you call now! So pick up the phone and call, and in no time at all you could be the next hot country songwriter-if you can spell truck, party, girl, beer, and Bocephus, you have what it takes to write a country hit! You don’t actually even have to know
how to spell them, because the singers can’t pronounce them anyway! So call now, to receive our secret package for a limited time at the low low price of $99.99! This offer is limited, so don’t wait-call now!”
December 8, 2015 @ 6:49 pm
That was funny 🙂
December 8, 2015 @ 8:16 pm
Thank you kindly, and your generosity is appreciated *passes hat around*
December 8, 2015 @ 3:37 am
I’d never payed attention to the Brett Michaels video before, but I just noticed they filmed it at a local venue out here in LA that films videos for a lot of country singers and other performers.
I always get a kick out of seeing a stage that I play on as part of a video though, its pretty funny.
December 8, 2015 @ 6:17 am
I did notice that he’s wearing the same stupid wide headband that he wore in his Eighties “hair metal” videos. At least I hope it’s not literally the same one. Some male pattern baldness going on there? Or was he worried that no one would recognize him if he didn’t wear it? As in “Aha, it’s that guy from Whitesnake!” LOL
December 8, 2015 @ 8:06 am
I’m trying to think of how to put this the right way because its been on my mind…..I am begining to see, not just from everybody involved with this site but in Country speculation in general, that younger country artists, roughly under 35, cannot come out and speak their own language and make music in a way that they have been influenced by growing up in the times they have which are very different than the way traditional country used to be. This battle, has turned into something completely different than it represented when it started and what I respected it and stood by it for. Its been admitted here on this site that : a lot of traditionalists are stuck in a misguided notion to think that all country music must sound extremely traditional at all times or it can”™t qualify as country at all, have built their entire identities around being oppressed as a traditional country fan, and that they don”™t want others impinging on the reality they”™ve set for themselves because they have been fighting for it for so long. And I get it. I feel it sometimes myself. But the fight has gone astray. To a point that if you don’t write or cut songs that sound like they were written by Merle or Willie themselves that its not country and will be crucified. So I want to know, what does “the evolution” look like? I really and truely want to know. Or do you all even want evolution, should it just sound the same until the end of time? What is it supposed to be?
December 8, 2015 @ 9:25 am
Country music must evolve. It must change. It must speak to the issues and the perspective of today, or it will die. It doesn’t mean there can’t be artists who make country in the older style. It’s great there’s so many still dedicated to that. But it must move forward at the same time.
That is and was the genius of Sturgill Simpson, and the reason he went from a nobody to arguably the most influential artist of the last two years. He’s traditional, but with a forward-thinking attitude and style. It is possible to both respect the roots of the music, and do something innovative.
I hope this helps answer your question.
December 8, 2015 @ 10:41 am
How many people really need to wear a cowboy hat today? I think country has often appealed to people who don’t like the present or the recent past and loathe what they see coming in the future. That is part of why it appeals to me. Not nostalgia, necessarily, but the remaining sliver of anything decent. People who would rather read a Wister novel than 50 Shades of Grey.
December 8, 2015 @ 1:11 pm
Amen RD, my thoughts exactly. Country music began as a distinct genre with the Original Carter Family and Jimmie Rodgers, in the Twenties, for goodness sake. It “evolved” with honky tonk, western swing, Countrypolitan, the outlaw movement, the new traditionalists. but through all the changes, something fundamental was never lost sight of, that made country music, “country”. The people who initiated the evolutions were as aware of country’s roots as the people who came before them, and held onto those roots in one way or another. (They would certainly have never, ever even have thought of their country music ancestors as “old farts and jackasses”, much less have had the nerve to say it publicly). As has been said, new “country” is the first time that not only has the music been cut off from its roots, but it’s proudly announced that this pruning has been done, ie, “it’s not your father’s country music anymore’. Well, nobody needs to say it, because we can tell from listening that it’s not even country music anymore. Not having humans play the instruments is not country. Not being savvy with songwriting, even in throw-away novelty and parody songs, is not country. Country was music that anyone who play some chords on a guitar and had a gift for lyrics could make, it didn’t require fancy-shmancy production (though countrypolitan made that work in a country context, and there are those who could make a righteous argument that countrypolitan wasn’t one of country music’s shining moments, though i’m not one of them-I like some of it) It was the people’s music, from its folk roots. It was adult music, though many a child grew up hearing and loving the sounds of Hank Williams and Patsy Cline. It was working class and middle class music. What it never was until now, was strictly music for the youth, with all the reaching for a “young” sound and for the youth demographic, and no one else (well, there was the soccer mom era, but they were young adults themselves).
So what are we middle-aged and senior people supposed to listen to? That leaves us with either the classic country, or music that we didn’t grow up with ourselves-I mean, we’re not exactly the Glenn Miller generation, just because we’ve reached the age of our parents or grandparents who were that generation.
So, evolution can happen without killing the roots and telling all of us who grew up with and loved country as it was traditionally (if loosely) defined, to either get over it or get lost.
Just wait until YOUR children try to evolve whatever will be known as “country music” into ambient New Age music, or whatever is the new thing in that day.
December 8, 2015 @ 1:38 pm
Hey! Now I get it! Now I understand! Now I see why rock had to be killed-because if rock was still around and thriving, the kids would still have their own music, and TPTB wouldn’t be able to move them over into country music so that they could kill it too! As a formerly mostly traditional genre of music, country HAD to die, and it wouldn’t die as long as the kids (who tend to be more liberal until they grow up, at least some of them) had their own music by which to rebel! So once rock is dead, the kids move into country, destroy the “countriness” (which was a basically conservative POV), and kill it too!
If you just ponder it long enough, you will always come to see the conspiracy! LOL!
December 8, 2015 @ 10:34 am
I guess the biggest issue for me with mainstream country is how lazy and samey-sounding it’s gotten. Same words, same chords, same tempo. It seems more pandering than artistic. And the way it’s completely overtaken more traditional material so you can’t even hear it on radio anymore. I’d point to Chris Stapleton, Kacey Musgraves, Ashley Monroe, Zac Brown Band, Miranda Lambert as artists who’ve made modern music that still sounds country. Cam’s “Burning House” was an interesting hit this year. Not traditional country at all, but a logical evolution point.
I’m fine with rock or pop elements in country. Just keep it creative and interesting. I don’t even mind some EDM elements, like what Beck has done. I’m not sure what makes today’s kids so different from any other generation. I grew up in the 80s and 90s, I’m every bit as much influenced by rock, pop, new wave, and punk and hip hop to smaller degrees, than I am by country. But I still recognize that country music needs to have some representation of its roots, or there’s no point even calling it country anymore.
December 8, 2015 @ 9:45 am
I definitely agree with him as an example but this idea just feels out of hand to me Trigger. These people live secluded little lives and don’t know what an average American kid’s life is like now. I don’t care where you grow up or how many Johnny Cash songs your Grandpa forced you to listen to, the environment and culture people grow up in now is different, they talk different, listen to different things, do different things for fun, and experience life different, and it takes relating to your everyday people to move the genre forward not just old-timers and people who listen to nothing but classics. Artists should be able to represent the younger demographic and speak their language and still be country in a progressed form. But it feels like the door is shut on that. I was very critical of what Luke said months ago and I don’t think he even fits in that realm, he’s definitely the middle-aged guy trying to be cool with the younger crowd, but I do see how there can be artists out there who actually have that frustration.
December 8, 2015 @ 1:26 pm
And you don’t think that generations before you felt the same way, that yours is the first? That was one of the reasons for the “outlaw” movement–get this, younger people felt that country music had gotten too smooth for its own good, too far away from its roots, and wanted to take it back to the country, with a little of rock’s kickazz attitude thrown in for good measure! Just imagine that! But you could never hear a Waylon, Willie, or Tompall song and not immediately recognise it as country-it was the more mainstream crossover pop stuff which was giving hardcore country fans grief! So they put back the honky tonk edginess, updated as a touch of rock, and sounded more country than any “Islands In The Stream” or “Don’t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue”-they put the country BACK into country. Today’s “artists” are killing whatever remains of the “countriness” of country music-that’s not evolution, that’s certainly not devolution-going back to the roots-that’s just murder. At first they kept the country “image” while taking the country out of the music, now they don’t even have to bother with the image, fait accompli.
December 8, 2015 @ 1:45 pm
Uh, you think people who love country had to be forced to listen to Johnny Cash as children? Look son, when I was as young as, say, 11 years old (don’t want to give too much away here), I was groovin to “Satin Sheets” by Jeanne Pruett and I wanted to BE Tammy Wynette! I loved Conway Twitty and decided that when I grew up, I was going to marry Glen Campbell!
And do you REALLY believe that anyone who grew up loving country music, necessarily grew up in rural seclusion? My but you ARE innocent!
I should cut you some slack because you ARE young, but that was a bold and arrogant, not to mention assinine, statement to make-since you think your generation is ready to rule the world now, I think you can take it.
December 8, 2015 @ 6:55 pm
Give em hell Mel
December 8, 2015 @ 7:38 pm
No I just think the ones who think Johnny, Willie, and Waylon were the last ones to make Country grew up there lol. Its no more bold and arrogant than the statements made by snotty traditionalists just because every younger artist doesn’t dress like John Wayne and that they grew up with a wider spectrum of music.
December 8, 2015 @ 8:00 pm
Who said anyone had to dress like John Wayne? Not me, I haven’t mentioned wardrobe. Who said Willie & Co were the last ones to change the direction of country? Not me, the new traditionalists came after them. Who said these things? (Though I hope I never live to see the day that a country artist comes out dressed like the hair metal band Poison, or Madonna, or early Elton John. Oops, too late, the woman in the “Sugar” video looks like her wardrobe is the spawn of Christina Aguilera and an Easter egg).
So tell me, what’s your opinion of “country” music evolving by incorporating, say, ambient music or death metal? Or, heaven help us, krautrock? If it’s negative, why not? Shouldn’t country always be “evolving”, so as to be relevant to The Youth Of America? Which youth? Some youths like thrash, shouldn’t “country” music pander to their tastes too? (At least they’d have to know how to play instruments again). What about the really young youths-do they get incorporate, say, Barney The Purple Dinosaur into country music? Or the theme from Sesame Street? Which youths get to say? And what do we old geezers do, just sit back, keep our mouths shut, and nod in agreement once the youths (whichever ones have the final say) decide that yes, this sure is country, it just “evolved”? And in the meantime listen to the music of our parents or grandparents (as an example, I happen to like big band music and the great American Songbook standards). Yes, I’m using the argument reductio ad absurdum, but this is the debate we’re having, just on a slightly more reasonable level. How far can the boundaries be stretched before it’s longer recognisably country music? IMO, they’ve already been broken and the traces burned.
December 8, 2015 @ 8:20 pm
When those things happen we’ll discuss that then. In the meantime, unless you’re one of the people I described then we have no issue here because whether you want to realize it or not, there are tons of them. And they are not just making arguments to “preserve the roots.” It isn’t possible for artists to come out that will satisfy them for reasons Trigger has listed here before.
December 8, 2015 @ 8:09 pm
Those people are just morons Anthony. Besides who said everybody in country music has to dress like John Wayne (assuming you mean like McClintock John Wayne not “Sands of Iwo Jima John Wayne)? I think most people would be more satisfied simply if most of the music didn’t suck dick. Staunch traditionalists (like myself) will seek out the type of country they like no matter what is on the radio. I know this because again, this is what I did even when the music on the country station still resembled country music (a la say 1990-96 or so). While Garth was all the rage, I was more into Alan Jackson and mark chestnut. When everybody swooned over Toby Keith I was seeking out br549 and the derailers. You get the point. I just think that there should be a place at the table for songs that actually say something, traditional musicianship, and artists who don’t wear skinny jeans.
Pop country has always been there and always will be and that’s fine, I’ll just switch the station. It’s the fact that the entire mainstream genre has gone off the grid into this shitty EDM, rap, bro, tailgate, bonfire, back road, laundry list land that has left a lot of us old fuckers shaking our fists and cussing at the radio.
December 8, 2015 @ 8:26 pm
I agree with those particular statements 100%. But I’ve had it with the morons like you said. They’re not fighting the same fight you are describing.
December 8, 2015 @ 8:26 pm
Yes, yes, yes! You said it so much more succinctly, but then I’m a woman, I like to argue 🙂
December 10, 2015 @ 12:53 pm
I thought “Sands of Iwo Jima” was better than “McClintock.”
My favorite Duke Man film has got to be “The Cowboys.”
December 9, 2015 @ 4:34 am
Oh, I forgot to take issue with your statement that your generation grew up with a wider spectrum of music. This a a blog dedicated to saving country music, so I talk country music. Do you know how many genres of music have died or left the mainstream of popular music since before your generation appeared on planet earth? It can happen and has happened. And I grew up listening to many, many of them, as did many other people. There may be many more niches of rock music these days, but rock as an overarching mainstream genre is gone, at least from mainstream radio. Genres can have their day, peak, and die-ie big band/swing, certain forms of jazz (bebop, cool jazz), or splinter into dozens of niches (ie progressive rock) and at best become a miniscule underground, or no longer be “living” music and only be trotted out now and then for nostalgic purposes (Tin Pan Alley/Great American Songbook) or become living fossils (opera, for the most part-modern operas don’t usually make it into the broader public consciousness whereas at one time everyday people whistled snatches of tunes from opera, as it was the pop music of that day) or operetta (which I happen to love, but when’s the last time anyone wrote one that anyone has ever heard of?)
Music can die, or become so set in stone that it becomes a living fossil. We have to find a happy medium for country music if we don’t want to see either of those things happen to it-the rules can be stretched, but if they’re broken and thrown away, there won’t be anything which could be called recognisably “country” music. Too many people who are using the country genre as their foot in the door to stardom not only break all the rules, they don’t seem to have ever known or understood them. IMO, breaking the rules only works well if you knew what the rules were in the first place, and have some respect for them. (IMO-humans actually playing the instruments is one of the rules. And autotune-just no. If you can’t carry a tune, either sing something which fits your range, or don’t make music your livelihood. What’s next, music made by robots, and watching said robots perform it? Or is there something I don’t know, and that’s already happened?)
Bluegrass seems to manage this quite well, but then few people expect to ever become rich and famous using bluegrass as their jumping-off point into the music industry.
December 10, 2015 @ 12:50 pm
When I was like 14 I wanted to dress like Porter Wagoner and play the fiddle like Vassar Clements… The dressing was easy, but I’m not even a tenth of the way there on the fiddle yet.
December 8, 2015 @ 10:15 am
I’m sure all of the above songs are bad. Let me just say I haven’t heard most of them. Why? Because 2015 was the year I gave up on country radio. It’s just too hard to find a decent song anymore.
December 8, 2015 @ 7:34 pm
Right on the money!
December 8, 2015 @ 8:10 pm
Look, after all my verbiage, all I’m saying is this-people should make whatever music they want, listen to whatever they like-but don’t call it “country” when there’s nothing country about it. There ARE rules for country music, as nebulous as they may be. Why don’t these people be really innovative, if it’s all about the music for them as they claim, and start a new genre, and let country be country, instead of using it as the lowest platform dive into the music industry pool they could manage? It’s like country music is everybody’s sucker now.
December 8, 2015 @ 9:39 pm
Hey Trigger: I know it wasn’t release as a single but on the dishonorable list is Tyler Farr “C.O.U.N.T.R.Y.”
December 9, 2015 @ 12:02 am
Wow for the sheer lack of women on country radio and in the news they sure put out a lot of stinkers!
December 9, 2015 @ 7:56 am
Other songs that need to be added:
-Kiss You in the Morning by Michael Ray (He called a girl an outlaw, like he knows what that is).
-Break Up with Him by Old Dominion (pleading for someone to break up because you are lusting after him is pathetic.
-Strip it Down by Luke Bryan (is it just me or does he sexually deprived?).
-Southern Belles by Scotty McCreery (the video is the worst in terms of objectification).
-Be My Love Song by Easton Corbin
-Buy Me a Boat by Chris Janson (I had to laugh that he thought people called him a Redneck).
-God Made Girl by RaeLynn (I Just can’t take her voice not to mention the backwards message).
-Gonna by Blake SHelton (I had to laugh at the phrase working on a long-term plan, gonna be your man until I see a hotter girl).
-Little Red Wagon by Miranda Lambert ( I love her but this song is pointless).
-Take It on Back Chase Rice (cliched song).
-Sun Daze by FGL (just say you want sex).
-Anything Goes by FGL (I have to admit that the line “Victoria’s Secret ain’t a secret no more but these guys obviously failed English in school).
-Hell of A Night By Dustin Lynch (all we need is a J-uly, enough said?)
-Sangria by Blake Shelton (Just another poorly one sex song).
Sam Hunt (anything he releases).
That is just my list because unfortunately for me I can’t play my Ipod in my car and my CD’s have been lost so I have to listen to the radio and the strongest stations are country (or maybe I’m a masochist and I love to torture myself). I hope 2016 is better for country music. On the bright side a friend of mine was disgusted with country music and I turned her on to this. I love this site and lets keep trying to save what’s left of country music!
December 10, 2015 @ 3:17 pm
Dear Lord, I hate God Made Girls with a passion. And Kiss You In The Morning.
December 9, 2015 @ 11:30 am
I really like “Buy Me a Boat” and “Baby be my love song”.
December 10, 2015 @ 7:20 am
I am completely shocked! 150 comments in and there have been no bro-country groupies spewing their idiocy on this thread.
December 10, 2015 @ 12:12 pm
I used to get that all the time. Now that Facebook has so tweaked their algorithm to only see things that reinforce your current beliefs, articles like this rarely or never make it to the other side.
December 10, 2015 @ 12:37 pm
Really? I can’t block Blake Shelton on there, because apparently “The Voice” is unblockable, and with Reba sharing that dumb “Blake Shelton come to our class” photo incessantly I can’t get away from him.
But isn’t this place more peaceful without a bunch of teenagers insulting us for our “meanness” and telling us “don’t like don’t listen?”
December 10, 2015 @ 3:14 pm
Long time reader, first time commenter.
I love Trigger’s blog, especially his rants. They make my day, they are so hilarious and spot-on.
After careful consideration, I have chosen my top 10 worst songs of 2015. These will be in countdown form to make it interesting. So, without further ado, here we go!
10. Luke Bryan, “Kick the Dust Up” — This has got to be one of the laziest songwriting attempts ever. This song made the list due to stupid lines like “got me a jar full of clear” and “knock, knock, knock goes the diesel, if you really wanna see the beautiful people”. Seriously, Luke, my cats could write better songs than this.
9. Luke Bryan and Karen Fairchild, “Home Alone Tonight” — One of the most immature songs I’ve ever heard in my life. Two random strangers hook up at a bar and take selfies and send them to their exes. Keep in mind these are two grown-ass human beings behaving like children. I mean, selfies (or should I say “payback pictures”), really, Luke? Your pushing forty freaking years old. It’s time to grow the hell up. And on another note, Karen sounds as if she is completely disinterested and would rather do anything but sing this song. And I sure don’t blame her if that is the case.
8. Luke Bryan, “Strip it Down” — This is just a re-write of Jason Aldean’s god-awful monstrosity of 2014, “Burnin’ It Down”. This is not a sexy song, it is a stupid song. A stupid song that has no place on country radio or in country music, period.
7. Cole Swindell, “Let Me See Ya Girl” — Stupid song with stupid lyrics by a stupid artist. I cannot stand Cole Swindell.
6. Chase Rice, “Gonna Wanna Tonight” — Of course, the worst of 2015 list wouldn’t be complete without an appearance by the biggest douchebag in country music, Mr. Chase Rice. This is just another shitty bro-country song with lyrics devoid of any sort of substance whatsoever.
5. Bret Michaels, “Girls on Bars” — I stumbled across this song while reading Trigger’s absolutely excellent and hilarious rant on this song. However, I made the grave mistake of pushing play on the video. Holy shit on a biscuit, this was bad. Very, very bad. I made it until after the first chorus, then I shut it off and resumed listening to Kacey Musgraves, an excellent country artist (and my idol, I wanna be a country singer) who knows much more about country music than Mr. Bret Michaels does or ever will.
4. Danielle Bradbery, “Friend Zone” — This was more of a disappointment than anything, seeing as I enjoyed her debut album fairly well. Oh well, better luck next time, Danielle. You’re gonna need it, because this song sucks.
3. Uncle Ezra Ray, “BYHB” –OH MY GOD. Horrific. That’s all I got.
2. Tie: Haley Georgia, “Ridiculous” and Old Dominion, “Break Up With Him”‘– I couldn’t pick between these two, they’re so bad they both deserve the number two slot on my worst of list. At this point, trashing “Ridiculous” would be well, ridiculous. It was a huge commercial flop, and rightfully so. Although it majorly flopped, it still deserves a place in my worst of 2015 list, because it sucked big time. Up until about a week ago, I was going to give Old Dominion the #1 slot for the god-awful “Break Up With Him”. I hate this song so much, it is the creepiest, most misogynic, shitty, clusterfuck of a douchefest I have ever heard. It is extremely offensive, and absolutely not country in any way, shape, or form. If a guy were to sing this directly to me, I would smack him in the face, no questions asked. Absolutely disgusting.
And now, for the worst of the worst…drum roll please…
1. Michael Ray, “Real Men Love Jesus” — No, I’m not kidding. I’m surprised this song isn’t talked about more. This was a sure fire pick for #1. No contest, not even with “Ridiculous” or “Break Up With Him”. This, along with the absolutely horrible Raelynn song, “God Made Girls”, are the single most offensive songs in country music. Don’t even start about on how this actually does sound country. It’s still incredibly offensive and sexist. Slam Sam Hunt, Luke Bryan, and the bros all you want, but this shit is worse than anything those guys have ever done. Michael Ray is a horrid little fraud, and has no place or right to decide what a real man is or isn’t. I can’t believe I paused Gary Allan to listen to this heaping pile of garbage. Although this is a country song, it is an absolute mess. Absolute shit. I’d rather listen to the entire Luke Bryan Kill The Lights album on repeat for an entire week straight than hear this ever again. I hate this damn song with everything inside me. It is a disgusting song and a disgrace to country music.
Sorry for all of the ranting 😉
Of course, there are a few dishonorable mentions, but this post focuses primarily on the worst of the worst.
I also put together a best of 2015 in mainstream country music too, but I’ll save it for another post. 🙂
Here’s to hoping 2016 is a much better year for country music 🙂
December 11, 2015 @ 10:42 am
Good stuff Amanda. Thanks for reading.
January 17, 2016 @ 8:33 am
Completely correct.Except for We went you, actually singled out correctly bad country music.Surprised Anything Goes did’nt make the list though.
February 5, 2016 @ 7:02 pm
All you little shits are fucking negative. Not everyone likes a song but the dishonor is the way you bitch about it. No one gives a fuck what you think and it won’t change how other people feel about a song. One of the songs on this list helped me get through a really rough time and I honestly don’t think I could’ve gotten to where I am now if I hadn’t heard the song and thought “I can relate to that”
Have some respect.