What, exactly constitutes "country music?"

[Pulp, SASS#28319]

_{I'm not a big fan either, I do like a few of the songs, but for the most part, "Meh" However, about a year ago I started hearing some stuff called RedDirt music. Surprisingly, I really like it. Here's one I like from the Turnpike Troubadours. The lead singer is a local boy, but I've never met him.}

 

_{https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ki4VJCsF0qk}

 

_{Damn Quails is another group I like.}

[Rex M Rugers #6621]

Well , everybody has their favorites , and opinion of what is good or otherwise , or unlistenable. For me , after Ray Price and Patsy Cline , the others I like are all second place. I am a fan of Western Swing also , with Bob Wills and The Texas Playboys tops , with Spade Cooley , and Asleep at the Wheel up there close.

Also enjoy Swing and Pop from the late 30s and 40s into early 50s. And a middling fan of Western music. I record the Ranger Doug's Classic Cowboy Corral show every week. some of it is lame , but get to hear some gems along the way. Jimmy Wakely , Eddy Dean , Rex Allen , Elton Britt , Ken Curtis , Roy , Gene , etc. Oh , the nostalgia.

Thank you XM radio. Rex

[Noz]

_{I'm not a big fan either, I do like a few of the songs, but for the most part, "Meh" However, about a year ago I started hearing some stuff called RedDirt music. Surprisingly, I really like it. Here's one I like from the Turnpike Troubadours. The lead singer is a local boy, but I've never met him.}

 

_{https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ki4VJCsF0qk}

 

_{Damn Quails is another group I like.}

I forgot about his. My daughter discovered them a while back and sent me a couple of links. Pretty good.

[Boon Doggle]

"We got two kinds of music here. Country, and Western."

[Allie Mo, SASS No. 25217]

Hi Folks,

 

I think of Randy Travis like I think of Phil Collins, "a little goes a long way." In other words, one of them every 50 or so songs is sufficient.

 

Patsy, Willie, Johnny, June, Merle, Marty, Waylon, Loretta, Emmylou, Charlie, Bonnie, Reba, Conway, Lyle...

 

Regards,

 

Allie

[Dungannon Gunner]

Must have one of the following components

 

Momma

Teddy Bear

Somebody did me wrong

Train

Truck

Death

Honky-Tonk

[Muleshoe Bill SASS #67022]

Boon Doggle got it right.. There is Country and then there is Western. Roy Rogers, is Western music. Roy Acuff is country

[Loophole LaRue, SASS #51438]

Music is fluid and ever-changing. Once it stops, and becomes frozen in form and content, it becomes "classic". Problem is, while you may preserve the snapshot of a music form at some point in time, you cannot stop the progress of music development. You cannot force young musicians to write like the Beatles or sing like Merle Haggard. If you do, you are running a museum, not a recording business.

 

Learn to love it all!! (Except rap, which is a curse from the Dark One, played forward or in reverse!)

 

LL

[Tex Jones, SASS 2263]

Well , everybody has their favorites , and opinion of what is good or otherwise , or unlistenable. For me , after Ray Price and Patsy Cline , the others I like are all second place. I am a fan of Western Swing also , with Bob Wills and The Texas Playboys tops , with Spade Cooley , and Asleep at the Wheel up there close.

Also enjoy Swing and Pop from the late 30s and 40s into early 50s. And a middling fan of Western music. I record the Ranger Doug's Classic Cowboy Corral show every week. some of it is lame , but get to hear some gems along the way. Jimmy Wakely , Eddy Dean , Rex Allen , Elton Britt , Ken Curtis , Roy , Gene , etc. Oh , the nostalgia.

Thank you XM radio. Rex

+1

[Rye Miles #13621]

Music is fluid and ever-changing. Once it stops, and becomes frozen in form and content, it becomes "classic". Problem is, while you may preserve the snapshot of a music form at some point in time, you cannot stop the progress of music development. You cannot force young musicians to write like the Beatles or sing like Merle Haggard. If you do, you are running a museum, not a recording business.

 

Learn to love it all!! (Except rap, which is a curse from the Dark One, played forward or in reverse!)

 

LL

+1 on the rap!

 

It's not even music, it's bad poetry with a beat.

[Warden Callaway]

http://youtu.be/K-wJNpWgss8

[Houston CAS]

Today's country music has been infected with the rise of "bro country" -- more rockish, all about getting drunk in bars, and by mostly men. One song literally starts with the line "Hey girl... Wassup?"

 

"Girl in a Country Song" does a good job of explaining what's wrong with it these days.

[Blackwater 53393]

Today's country artists are mostly Linyrd Skinyrd wannabes that couldn't make it in rock 'n' roll! If the guys ain't pretty they don't make it and you don't have to be able to sing 'cause they have all the vocals run through pitch correction software and pro tools! All's you gotta do is be purdy, have a good sound engineer, and somebody in marketing that can sell your a$$!!

 

The gals need to be as sexy as possible and be willing to be as suggestive as possible in their videos. It is all about the marketing!!!

 

Come to think about it, 'bout ALL music is like that now!!

[Shawnee McGrutt]

On rap music - I think that is a form of torture, that is banned under the Geneva Convention. If not, it should be.

 

As for country music, I listen to the older stuff, the new "country" is just top 40 radio. Most of the country stations, here cycle the same playlist every two hours, so it gets old mighty fast.

[Bear Saint Paw]

Some others that have a lot of great songs, many that sound close to "Classic Country" but don't get thought of or played in mainstream radio,

 

Earl Thomas Conley

John Conlee

Conway Twitty

Charlie Pride

Charlie McClain

Toby Keith

Doug Stone

Diamond Rio

John Anderson

Gene Watson

Josh Turner

Sammy Kershaw

Shenandoah

[DocWard]

Music is fluid and ever-changing. Once it stops, and becomes frozen in form and content, it becomes "classic". Problem is, while you may preserve the snapshot of a music form at some point in time, you cannot stop the progress of music development. You cannot force young musicians to write like the Beatles or sing like Merle Haggard. If you do, you are running a museum, not a recording business.

 

Learn to love it all!! (Except rap, which is a curse from the Dark One, played forward or in reverse!)

 

LL

 

I would say yes... and no... Certainly music evolves over time, but there are specific markers that constitute identifiable pieces of genres. However, at some point in that evolution, it becomes something else. To run with the evolution analogy a little, it can either become a sub-genre such as heavy metal or punk, or it can become another genre entirely, as rock became distinct from blues. As I mentioned earlier, of the types of rock I can think of, with few exceptions, one can trace them to their blues roots, recognize a back beat, among other things. Are they the rock of Buddy Holly? No. Can you see how you got from Buddy Holly, to the Beatles, to Led Zeppelin, to Rush, to Dream Theater and others? Usually. In the song I heard that caused me to pose the original question I heard none of the identifiable markers of a country song, just a sort of nasal twang in the vocals.

 

As for rap, I went to an inner city high school as hip hop was just emerging as a genre. I don't care for where it has gone, but I don't mind the older stuff, and even have a bit on my iPod.

[Ornery Cuss]

Can't believe nobody's mentioned Tom Paul (or sometimes "ThomPall") and the Glaser Brothers. I've been a country music fan since the late 40's-early 50's (I remember when Hank died) when my favorites were Webb Pierce, Hank Snow, etc.. Around the 80's, the Glaser Bros. had numerous incredible songs and, to my mind, are still maybe the easiest-listening group with their brother harmonies. However, for some reason, they have never really received much recognition from the 'establish' country music scene in Nashville, and apparently will never make the CM HOF. That's outrageous. If you haven't heard any Glaser Bros. music, try youtube and listen to a half dozen or so. And, for a solo singer, Gene Watson is hard to beat; fantastic voice.

 

I quit listening to CM when "I got friends in low places" became a big "hit". Haven't listened to any CM since. (Except my old records and tapes.)

 

Ornery Cuss

[Elk Creek LeMieux]

I'm almost ill...

 

Two pages and I don't see Chris LeDoux's name anywhere... He, was country.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwAGJiDslAo

 

 

 

 

 

On the new stuff, some of them are alright, most of them stray more than they stay on track.

[Elk Creek LeMieux]

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rls6HbsrTX4

[DocWard]

I'm almost ill...

 

Two pages and I don't see Chris LeDoux's name anywhere... He, was country.

 

 

I haven't been listing names except as they serve to further my thoughts and explanations, but I must say I like his stuff. He passed far too early.

[Elk Creek LeMieux]

 

I haven't been listing names except as they serve to further my thoughts and explanations, but I must say I like his stuff. He passed far too early.

 

Agreed.

 

I passed on a couple opportunities to see him in concert.

 

Kicking myself for that.

[Nasty Newt # 7365]

Music is fluid and ever-changing. Once it stops, and becomes frozen in form and content, it becomes "classic". Problem is, while you may preserve the snapshot of a music form at some point in time, you cannot stop the progress of music development. You cannot force young musicians to write like the Beatles or sing like Merle Haggard. If you do, you are running a museum, not a recording business.

 

Learn to love it all!! (Except rap, which is a curse from the Dark One, played forward or in reverse!)

 

LL

Calling pop and rock music country music is not "the progress of music development." If a bunch of rock and roll pickers and pop singers went down to Bourbon Street, started playing their music, and said "This is the New Jazz, get over it!" they would be tarred and feathered. In Nashville, they were welcomed with open arms. It cracked me up when Taylor Swift recently announced her big move from country to pop. Hell, she was pop from day one.

[Pulp, SASS#28319]

I'm gonna expose my ignorance here and freely admit I have no idea what most of the musical terms y'all been throwin' around mean. One night, at an Arlo Guthrie concert, he walked over to a piano and commenced to tellin' a story. Imagine that, Arlo tellin' a story. Anyway he said one day many years ago someone played three notes on a piano and that those three notes revolutionized music. Then he played those three notes, and went into a piano solo that sounded to me like jazz. I still don't have any clue what he was talking about, but he said those three notes are the basis for jazz, rock and roll, blues, country, etc. If nobody had ever played those three notes we'd still be listening to Mozart and his cohorts.

[Henry T Harrison]

 

And she ain't hard to look at

[DocWard]

I'm gonna expose my ignorance here and freely admit I have no idea what most of the musical terms y'all been throwin' around mean. One night, at an Arlo Guthrie concert, he walked over to a piano and commenced to tellin' a story. Imagine that, Arlo tellin' a story. Anyway he said one day many years ago someone played three notes on a piano and that those three notes revolutionized music. Then he played those three notes, and went into a piano solo that sounded to me like jazz. I still don't have any clue what he was talking about, but he said those three notes are the basis for jazz, rock and roll, blues, country, etc. If nobody had ever played those three notes we'd still be listening to Mozart and his cohorts.

 

I'm wondering if he was telling a story about what the three notes that I've heard called by different names, including "The Devil's Interval, or "The Devil's Chord." My music theory and music history is a bit weaker than I would like to admit, but I believe it is technically called a "Tritone" or an "Interval." If I recall correctly, and that is a very large "if," it was avoided in early religious music because of its dissonance, and it didn't come into use until much later. It is used in jazz, blues and rock quite prominently, and I would imagine in bluegrass and other music as well.

 

edit: I just checked with my daughter (music minor and aced music appreciation), and she confirmed, it is a tritone, she knew of it as "The Devil's Interval."

[Pulp, SASS#28319]

I just wiki'd tritone and it might as well have been written in Greek. Complicated stuff there.

[DocWard]

I just wiki'd tritone and it might as well have been written in Greek. Complicated stuff there.

 

Yeah, it is complex. I only sort of kind of understand it. A little. One of the reasons I texted my daughter.

 

But I would bet dollars to doughnuts that is what Arlo was talking about.

[Smokey Shayne]

I think a lot of peoples opinion of what is country music depends on their age. At 45, I grew up listening to Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, Don Williams....etc. I remember when Alabama first came on the scene, saw George Strait at a couple of local bars before he hit the big time.

 

I mostly like the older music myself, but there are a couple of the newer ones that I enjoy as well. Jamey Johnson, as someone mentioned, is an amazing singer/songwriter. Shooter Jennings, Waylons son, has done some really good stuff too. A lot of the "red dirt" music coming out of TX is some good listening as well.

 

Frank Foster, a fairly local guy around here has been on the top of my play list lately. His music isnt quite the "bro country" music that seems to be main stream right now. But it mostly some southern rock with a country flair. Any song that mentions a girls cut off jeans being "cheater pipe tight" has got to be good.....lol

[Dapper Dynamite Dick]

Some years ago, somebody at the annual Western Music Association Festival (when it was still in Tucson) made the comment that "Country music is some wannabe cowboy singing about some other wannabe cowboy's girlfriend. Western music is some cowboy singing about some cattleman's cows." -- GIT

Now that is good!!

[Sgt. C.J. Sabre, SASS #46770]

 

Learn to love it all!! (Except rap, which is a curse from the Dark One, played forward or in reverse!)

 

LL

The trouble is, so much of what passes for Country isn't much more than rap.

I grew up on Rock and Roll. Then Rock and Roll started to change. It became Disco. As the song says,

"Disco left him cold."

I discovered Country while stationed at Camp Lejeune in 1979. Waylon, Willie, Hank Jr. They were some of my early favorites. They still are.

But I even still remember that the "Old Timers" were commiserating the "death" of Country back then. It didn't die, but it did change. It changed into the music I loved. It's still changing.

Now Country sounds like Rap.

I understand it. But I don't have to like it. And I don't love it anymore.

[DocWard]

I grew up on Rock and Roll. Then Rock and Roll started to change. It became Disco. As the song says,

"Disco left him cold."

 

"Don't try to take me to a disco

You'll never even get me out on the floor

In ten minutes I'll be late for the door

I like that old time rock n' roll"

 

~ Bob Seger, Old Time Rock and Roll