I can’t tell if this is meant to be positive or negative but I’m going to interpret it in good faith because I have a lot of thoughts and feelings about country music.
As I said in my tags, I love country music. For argument’s sake, we’re casting country as a very broad genre, including bluegrass and rockabilly and blue yodeling. We’ll leave folk music in a gray area—people can get touchy if you call folk country or western but you can’t deny that country has a lot of roots in folk music, from instruments to themes. Hell, one of my recommendations in those tags, Knoxville Girl, is adapted from a 19th century Irish ballad adapted from an English ballad adapted from an Elizabethan ballad. Some folks consider zydeco to be country but I’d argue it’s closer to jazz, but it’s directly related to Cajun fiddle music which I do consider country, so. A lot of it is pedantry, really.
I get really frustrated by people who hate country music solely for being country, there’s a lot that can be criticized both musically and politically, but “country sucks” isn’t any of that. Toasty has a very justified criticism here—a lot of country breakup songs by men, for the last 20 years or so, have been specifically bro-country. You know, all the songs about drinking and hot girls and having a good time? Most of those are bro-country, and pretty much all of them are country pop, so they get a lot of radio time. Some of them draw from hokum, and a lot of those are fun, because of the time honored tradition of innuendo and committing to the bit.
(For example, I’m Gonna Miss Her is a fun breakup song because it’s got some hokum styling. The girlfriend presents an ultimatum—her, or fishing. If he goes out to fish, she’ll be gone by noon. The next verse begins “well I’m gonna miss her / when I get home” with a nice beat of comedic timing that lets us know he chose fishing. It’s playful and it’s not demeaning, and it’s not bro-country.)
I’m pretty sure you’ve heard a bro-country song before, no matter how into country music you may be. A lot of those hyper-patriotic country songs are bro-country, too. A non-exhaustive list of bro-country you’ve probably heard or at least heard of:
* Courtesy of the Red White and Blue
Maddie & Tae have the song “Girl in a Country Song” which is a direct criticism of how bro-country talks (sings) about women. “Like all we’re good for / is looking good for you and your friends / on the weekend, nothing more” and “get up in the truck / keep our mouths shut / and ride along,” and maybe most damningly, “being a girl in a country song / how in the world did it go so wrong,” and the bridge mentions Conway Twitty and George Strait, saying they never treated a girl like this. Country didn’t used to be like this, and not all modern country is like this, but it’s invading country pop so it gets a lot of radio time.
Some bro-country songs are fun, I can and will admit. I recognize Honkytonk Badonkadonk is objectifying and kind of forward, but it’s no more so than Queen’s Fat Bottomed Girls. Shaboozey’s “Bar Song” is very much bro-country in theme and lyrics but musically it’s closer to R&B than country pop, so it may be debatable. Good Time by Niko Moon makes you wanna have a good time. Arguably, Talladega Ten is a bro-country, but it’s also a song about a woman knowing she’s hot and feeling it. Just because it’s bro-country doesn’t necessarily mean it’s bad, but there’s a lot of bro country that ranges from moderately annoying to kind of sickening.
It didn’t used to like this. Even most of the pro-military country wasn’t so… patriotic, we’ll say. Private Malone is ostensibly about a military man, but it’s more about a young man who died young whose memory lives on in the guy who bought his car 30 years later. It’s a story about grief and memory, for all that the only named character is a guy who fought in Vietnam. And that’s not to say that there isn’t highly patriotic and kind of objectifying country music that’s older than the 1990s, there absolutely is, but it wasn’t what defined the genre for people who didn’t really listen to it the way it does now.
There’s a certain kind of man that perceives performing to be feminine, so they overcompensate with aggression and shallowness. It’s emasculating to be emotionally vulnerable. So that’s birthing a lot of those terrible and annoying country songs, especially those awful breakup songs. These guys have heroes in classic country artists but don’t seem to want to acknowledge that a lot of them are crooners who cared about the difference between the pop-influenced Nashville sound, the rock-influenced Bakersfield sound, the Neo-traditional Texas sound, and the folksy Tulsa sound. They wanna be country stars without the heart that ties country, roots, and blues together. A lot of folks like country because of the grit of it—gravel in the throat, beat up guitars and banjos, wearing out your fiddle strings—and some people interpret that as very masculine and tough, but what makes all that grit, and makes it good, is passion and emotion.
I’m gonna get a little soppy here, so forgive me. Nothing makes me believe in love, or grief, or community, or myself, quite like country music. My heroes have always been cowboys and coal miner’s daughters, farmers and union workers, truck drivers who tear through police barricades and talk all night to kids who miss their dad. In my heart, a good country song tells a story. You keep listening because you get invested in what happens next. The murder ballad is a hallmark, and they’re so good, but there’s so many more stories. As a genre, country is full of love and humour and heartbreak, murder and moonshining, holding your hand out to neighbors and strangers alike when they need a little help. It’s about living slow because you have to grow with the seasons, and getting old too fast as you break your back for scrip and shoes on your kids feet. It’s standing and screaming about how you can never settle down, and the joy of front porch sitting to watch the day go by. It’s life on the road desperate to get home, just 20 more miles, and wanting desperately to get out and make your name far from your small town roots. It tells you that being an outlaw means something. That being a rebel without a cause can be lonely but being a rebel with one isn’t. That if you’re gonna stand for something you better stand with your chest out, shoulders back, and head high.
I’m not unaware that part of my fondness is nostalgia. I remember catching crawdads in the river mud. I learned to ride a tractor before I ever got in the front seat of a car. I had friends who raised chickens and goats. I’m, to an extent, the intended audience of the genre. I grew up on it. The right country song at the right time makes me feel like I’m 7 years old again, sitting in the car with my dad, not yet aware of my body or the world or what it feels lose someone.
Having said that, I think people don’t really give country a chance. Preconceived notions, memes, the country pop radio stations, classism, there’s a lot of reasons, but if all you hear is songs from whiny men who are trying to make themselves feel better, you’re not really experiencing the genre. Some folks have there exceptions—“I hate all country except Dolly/Miranda Lambert/Shania Twain/Willie Nelson”—but that’s still not really giving the genre a chance. Do you like rock and roll? Post punk? Midwest emo? I’ve got some country songs for you. Jazz? R&B? Soul? I’ve got some country songs for you. Musical theatre and theatrical pop? Oh boy do I have country songs for you. Rap? I’ve got some country songs for you, too, though some of them will be more talking blues. Reggae? I’ve got a whole subgenre for you that pulls from calypso and reggae, and while Jimmy Buffett may be the most well known artist he’s certainly not the only one. If your thing is industrial or electronica or metal, I’m gonna have a harder time but I’ll try. The Afro-fusion scene in country is woefully thin, especially considering how much of it is rooted in music from enslaved Africans, but the Latin-fusion scene is pretty good, especially the blending on the Texas sound and Tejano music. Point me in a direction and I’ll do my best to find something for you. I’ve got some issues with country pop, which I think is obvious, but I’ll plumb those depths too if you want. If your thing is classical I’ve got maybe 2 fiddle heavy recommendations but I’ll look for more. You like tearjerkers? I got plenty. You want something silly? I’ve got it. You wanna party? Don’t worry.
There’s so much country music out there, and just like any other genre, it runs the gamut in quality, theme, and popularity. It’s no better or worse than any other genre, I just happen to love it and have a lot of opinions, and most people have only heard a small range.
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