Jukebox (in)Jury
“[T]he very essence of country music is that push-pull between commercial expedience and soul baring.”
A fun day on ye olde Blueskye Mystery Jukebox yesterday (created by Michael Gallagher – there are rules). Michael was hosting and his keyword was River, which opened up a huge number of possibilities across eras and genres. There were covers of “Take Me to the River” and people were “Down by the River” or “Watching the River Flow”…
You could make yourself quite the playlist. I almost posted Springsteen’s “The River”, which was so formative to me (someone else did), but went with Robbie Robertson’s “Somewhere Down the Crazy River” because I both love it and smile at the memory of laughing at it (and its silly video) with my younger daughter. I could have posted The Gaslight Anthem, Jason Isbell, Sam Cooke, Trisha Yearwood, Mavis Staples, Jimmy Cliff, Audrey Hepburn, or Molly Tuttle. But my other pick was, of course, Eric Church (“Evangeline“) because he’s great and I never miss an opportunity to play that track.
Which led to a little discussion on Bluesky about Country music, which many people are reluctant to listen to. I get it. It’s like if you said to me I should check out a Christian Rock band. I’d be like, urk! But then I listen to Hiss Golden Messenger a lot, and I think they were originally thought of as a Christian band. And so much of Country music is caught up in that bible belt stuff. I reconciled with it a long time ago, but I understand why people might be put off.
Almost inevitably, the distinction between what is called Americana and Country music came up. And I didn’t go off on my full rant (that was in 2012), but I did say that I don’t recognise the distinction.
The thing is, some people do see one end of country music as a sausage machine and the other end as kind of gritty and real. My argument is that you’d be surprised at how gritty and real (not to say grim) things can be at the sausage-machine end of the market. The hosts of the Big Beatles Sort Out have been nonplussed by the success of Ella Langley’s hit song “Choosin’ Texas”, which has been on or near the top of the Billboard Hot 100 for more than half a year. (She’s got another song in the Top 10 at the moment, too, which is very Beatles-like.) The charts are weird these days, right, but I think most people would put Ella Langley at the sausage-machine end of the Country-Americana spectrum, but for me there’s something quintessentially country about the phenomenon. You go back (as cited in my 2012 rant) to Patsy Cline, Tammy Wynette, Loretta Lynne, Dolly Parton, Tanya Tucker, and you see that, over and over again, the appeal of a talented young woman performing heartbreak over the radio (or on TV) is absolutely what Country is all about.
And if the industry subsequently chews her up and drops her down a memory hole, yep, that’s a pattern that repeats as well. Consier LeeAnn Rimes, Miranda Lambert, Carrie Underwood. If they come through the other side, they are big forever, but they don’t always come through.
As to the men, well. I know that a lot of people love Johnny Cash because he was such a shambling wreck—but check out the Randy Travis story. And remember: Dwight Yoakam is bald underneath that hat.
Marketing distinctions, that’s the only difference between Americana and Country. Americana artists write their own songs, maybe, but not always. And Country artists use songwriters, but maybe not so much these days. I think the thing that drew me to country music in the first place was that I realised that it was where the songs went. Alan Jackson and Dwight Yoakam have always written or co-written their own stuff. The beauty of Country always lies in the great songs, whoever wrote them. Those songwriters in Nashville, like Matraca Berg, Lori McKenna, Gretchen Peters, Chris Stapleton, Donavan Woods… talk about authentic.
Now, sometimes the politics are repellent, and I won’t have anything to do with an artist because of that. Then again, they do say that Nashville is a Blue Town in a Red State, so you never know.
Listen: you’ve got your singers, your songwriters, and your players. People talk about The Wrecking Crew, don’t they? But those Nashville session players are also incredible. It’s why Bob Dylan went there. And they’re still good. And while there are some terrible old hacks who sing like they’re trying to do a shit (Luke Combs), there are also some incredible vocalists in the field. Trisha, Martina, Jennifer, Karen, Alan, Dwight, Chris, Vince.
Oh, V~ince:
https://youtu.be/S293gS1OwGg?si=aB1SGGByIp0M2sqR
#americana #CountryMusic
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