Hear ye, hear ye: By the power vested in Saving Country Music, Friday August 28th, 2026 is officially being declared a country music holiday, with all the rights and privileges thereof due to the excessive amount of cool releases.
Look, I’m just gonna say what “If I Don’t Leave I’m Gonna Stay” is actually really all about. This isn’t about music. This isn’t about two country stars collaborating. Let’s just lay it all out right here.
You can’t save country music while ignoring commercial country. One of the ways we address the mainstream is by highlighting the best albums in the mainstream in hopes they help influence country moving forward.
Viral star Oliver Anthony unleashed a firestorm recently when he made multiple accusations against performers at country festivals as part of a greater 15-minute video rant addressing some of the ills of the country industry.
There is nothing more doltish and annoying than the low IQ commenter who decides to pipe up in the comments section of a social media post with the canned and thoughtless line “No one cares.”
The 2nd half of 2024 promises to be a very big and very busy time when it comes to album releases in country and roots music. Below you can find a list of Saving Country Music’s top recommended albums.
Carly Pearce has made it right to the City of Jeffersonville, Indiana after having to cancel a show last minute due to weather. Pearce was scheduled to perform a free concert in Jeffersonville on Saturday, July 1st.
Carly Pearce was scheduled to perform a free concert in Jeffersonville, Indiana on Saturday, July 1st as part of the city’s “Jammin’ in Jeff” series. But Pearce never took the Jeffersonville Riverstage as scheduled.
Ashley McBryde has enjoyed lots of critical success and awards recognition. Now hopefully her new album “The Devil I Know” earns her the breakout success she deserves.
The 2023 CMT Awards could very well go down in country music history as a significant moment, but it won’t be for the reasons the producers of the presentation or their proponents in the media hoped for, or will purport it to be. And no, we’re not just talking about the polarizing political moments…
This weekend, Police and Fire personnel had large swaths of downtown Austin cordoned off due to a mass casualty/hazardous exposure event, also known as the CMT Awards. The barriers and checkpoints weren’t there to keep freeloaders out, it was to keep the grotesque infection of pop country quarantined.
There may not be a better example of how cluttered and crazy release days have become over the last couple of years than what’s happening on March 24th. A total of 22 albums that have been pre-screened and selected to be considered for review by Saving Country Music are all being released on the same day.
For the last dozen years or so, one of the most contentious battles within the realm of commercial country music has centered around the incursion of hip-hop influences into the genre, and specifically the use of verses that are rapped as opposed to sung, and electronic beats replacing organic drums.
A pretty universal consensus from the country fans who did suffer through the presentation to see the extended Alan Jackson tribute at the end was that in 2022, the CMA Awards seemed to do a 180-degree turn, and started going back in the right direction toward featuring more actual country music.
Not since the emergence of Miranda Lambert have we seen a woman surface in mainstream country music with such promise and passion that carries a wide appeal through an infectious personality, and at an advantageous time when everything is aligning to allow her to be utterly successful.
It was revealed previously that between 2007 and 2014, Loretta Lynn had been making regular visits to the Cash Cabin Studios in Hendersonville, TN originally built by Johnny Cash, and recording tracks with her daughter Patsy Lynn Russell and John Carter Cash acting as producers.
Congratulations CMA Awards, you had an opportunity to save your relevance. And instead, just like much of the press, you have ignored the biggest cultural phenomenon in country music in 2022. But the CMA nominations aren’t all bad. Lainey Wilson leads all nominees with six.
In 2015, we couldn’t imagine artists not supported by mainstream country radio selling out arenas, and minting multiple Platinum singles without the help of Music Row. Here in 2022, Tyler Childers is considered one of the top artists in the entire country music industry, and now we have Zach Bryan.
For 10 years now, Dixon, California native Jon Pardi has been a bright spot in the mainstream of country, doing his damnedest to keep it real with ample fiddle and steel guitar, and songs that go a little deeper than many of his mainstream counterparts.
“It’s always going to evolve, but it seems to return to its roots, and I think that’s what’s happening now.” This was the assessment of country legend and “Class of ’89” member Clint Black during a recent appearance on Tracy Lawrence’s “Honky Tonkin'” radio show.
If Kane Brown loves his woman like he loves country music as he says in his new song, that means he’s sleeping with her sister and gave them both a case of chlamydia that he contracted from some floozie he picked up in a bar. “Toxic” to say the least.
“Tomorrow Me” is not a world beater. Luke Combs songs rarely are. But it’s just the latest sign that country music continues to trend more country, and more quality. Luke Combs has been a focal point for this trend since the start of his career.
Genre is not really the big issue with “Humble Quest.” It’s the energy, or lack thereof, and the generally uninspired matter-of-fact approach to the lyrics and really the music too that make Humble Quest just kind of pedestrian, especially for pop country.
Shit! No, not necessarily these nominations. Well, kind of the nominations as well. But the fact that by some obligatory sense of duty by the powers vested in me as the owner/operator of a country music website, I must convey the nominees of the 2022 ACM Awards, which have fallen so far down in relevancy […]