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wingedbeastDue to some details of my new job that aren't germain to this entry, I've been going around to a few places where I don't have control over the radio. At a couple places, they keep the radio to Country Music. I'll note that it's not my favored genre of music (and I'm not generally a music guy in the first place) and that's the limit of what I'll say, there.
So, I have to say it here. Country Music has changed.
Back in the late 80s and early 90s, when music was still mostly played on either cassette or record, there was still the Satanic Panic about evil messages when Rock&Roll was played backwards. As a result, there was a joke. "What do you get when you play a Country Western record backwards? You get your dog back, your house back, your wife back, your job back."
Country Music focused a great deal on things like small town (usually Southwestern) values and connecting to lower-income experience. That included music that dealt with loss of things like your job and your wife. It wasn't, by any means, limited to that. But, I'm seeing new limits... if nothing else in what gets repeated on the radio.
I can't really state these by name, but I can give some basic notes. There's a song with the repeated line of "I love this American life", which laments Jesus getting smaller and laughs about spilling coffee making you a million dollars. (By the way, I encourage you to watch the Adam Ruins Everything episode about court for, among other things, a debunking of that narrative of the McDonnalds suit.)
There's another song in which a man specifies that he's looked the whole world over for a home-town girl (a line which strikes me with how much the writer doesn't expect people to think about the song) and basically states the characteristics thereof. Said characteristics are sung and very clear about her values as opposed to those found in other American cultures.
Another song specifies a woman who was born and raised in New York by New York parents (of the view the songwriter has, which is wealthy, educated, and sophisticated as well as being deathly afraid of her being low-class at all) and still going out with the singer because "girls love a country man".
I've heard enough songs and I've heard, with only one song as exception, four main themes.
1. Country western culture is superior to others.
2. Other American cultures have inferior values.
3. Aggrievement that country-western culture doesn't have the socio-political dominance that the singers seem to think it deserves.
And, of course, 4, in which the culture is itemized to make sure you know what you have to do to be a part of this superior culture. (By the way, such items include an understanding of hard-work as only related to physical labor, an appreciation of whiskey, and sometimes church.)
The one exception to this was the song that frequently stated "this ain't your mother's broken heart". I can't tell if the commands of the song are her own to herself or her mother's to her. Either way, I find it expressive of the demands upon her (either internally or externally) that conflict with her emotions.
This might not be a representative sampling. After all, this is just what gets repeated on this one radio station. Still, it's a radio station that prides itself on playing new Country music and playing the hits. Additionally, it's a radio station that gets people singing along. And, it's music that screams the messages of "we're great", "other people suck", "isn't it horrible that more people aren't like us" and, most importantly "look how much I believe the three previous messages".
This contrasts against the songs on the rock station which are much less based in establishing the boundaries of a culture. Those songs are about the sensual pleasures of dance as expressed by non-deceptive hips, the feeling of being intensely attracted to a woman out of your "league", the sorrow of having rejected your love and regretting it, etc. I'm not saying that there are no cultural boundaries, but there there's a freedom to choose topics other than cultural boundaries and obviously listeners who are interested in those topics.
The possibility exists that I'm making a mountain out of a molehill. This is just one radio station. But, it seems a fairly popular one for people who enjoy Country music. And, the music that makes it onto that station most is this insecure need to make sure everybody knows the boundaries and superiority of the particular culture.
So, I have to say it here. Country Music has changed.
Back in the late 80s and early 90s, when music was still mostly played on either cassette or record, there was still the Satanic Panic about evil messages when Rock&Roll was played backwards. As a result, there was a joke. "What do you get when you play a Country Western record backwards? You get your dog back, your house back, your wife back, your job back."
Country Music focused a great deal on things like small town (usually Southwestern) values and connecting to lower-income experience. That included music that dealt with loss of things like your job and your wife. It wasn't, by any means, limited to that. But, I'm seeing new limits... if nothing else in what gets repeated on the radio.
I can't really state these by name, but I can give some basic notes. There's a song with the repeated line of "I love this American life", which laments Jesus getting smaller and laughs about spilling coffee making you a million dollars. (By the way, I encourage you to watch the Adam Ruins Everything episode about court for, among other things, a debunking of that narrative of the McDonnalds suit.)
There's another song in which a man specifies that he's looked the whole world over for a home-town girl (a line which strikes me with how much the writer doesn't expect people to think about the song) and basically states the characteristics thereof. Said characteristics are sung and very clear about her values as opposed to those found in other American cultures.
Another song specifies a woman who was born and raised in New York by New York parents (of the view the songwriter has, which is wealthy, educated, and sophisticated as well as being deathly afraid of her being low-class at all) and still going out with the singer because "girls love a country man".
I've heard enough songs and I've heard, with only one song as exception, four main themes.
1. Country western culture is superior to others.
2. Other American cultures have inferior values.
3. Aggrievement that country-western culture doesn't have the socio-political dominance that the singers seem to think it deserves.
And, of course, 4, in which the culture is itemized to make sure you know what you have to do to be a part of this superior culture. (By the way, such items include an understanding of hard-work as only related to physical labor, an appreciation of whiskey, and sometimes church.)
The one exception to this was the song that frequently stated "this ain't your mother's broken heart". I can't tell if the commands of the song are her own to herself or her mother's to her. Either way, I find it expressive of the demands upon her (either internally or externally) that conflict with her emotions.
This might not be a representative sampling. After all, this is just what gets repeated on this one radio station. Still, it's a radio station that prides itself on playing new Country music and playing the hits. Additionally, it's a radio station that gets people singing along. And, it's music that screams the messages of "we're great", "other people suck", "isn't it horrible that more people aren't like us" and, most importantly "look how much I believe the three previous messages".
This contrasts against the songs on the rock station which are much less based in establishing the boundaries of a culture. Those songs are about the sensual pleasures of dance as expressed by non-deceptive hips, the feeling of being intensely attracted to a woman out of your "league", the sorrow of having rejected your love and regretting it, etc. I'm not saying that there are no cultural boundaries, but there there's a freedom to choose topics other than cultural boundaries and obviously listeners who are interested in those topics.
The possibility exists that I'm making a mountain out of a molehill. This is just one radio station. But, it seems a fairly popular one for people who enjoy Country music. And, the music that makes it onto that station most is this insecure need to make sure everybody knows the boundaries and superiority of the particular culture.
no subject
Date: 2018-02-08 03:33 am (UTC)I mean you're not wrong. You just missed a theme, is all. Or possibly the station simply isn't playing a lot of "country women claim personal power, often with violence against men who done them wrong"?
no subject
Date: 2018-02-08 03:39 am (UTC)...
I do remember one sung by a woman instructing a man to get her to the little white church or else the breakfasts and the loving stops.
no subject
Date: 2018-02-08 10:39 pm (UTC)Even before the Civil War, the Southern image of Northern cities as dens of iniquity was largely about the latter’s immigrant population, and the common bashing of urbanites that runs all through country music cannot be separated from the cities’ ethnic diversity. Your points 1 through 3 are almost an exact description of the religious right, because it has the same cultural roots and generally the same fan base.
The genre has gotten worse in some ways since Garth Brooks. Bro-country stars offer pointless macho posturing and and mindless rural cheerleading, with “we’re country” used as a dog whistle. One country radio consultant took some criticism for saying that female performers are bad for ratings.