Comments on: Pop Goes the Country, Part I

By: dara

dara — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 04:12:46 +0000

i like pop country. there’s nothing nasty or wrong with it. why disect some of these artist. you dont like them , dont listen to them. love taylor swift and carrie underwood. they opened the door for me to explore country music.

By: Allergy Treatment

Allergy Treatment — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 09:56:32 +0000

I am very thankful to this topic because it really gives up to date information `;’

By: Carson

Carson — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 05:44:16 +0000

What I’m not too fond of are the current country artists who cite Rascal Flattsor Keith Urban or Carrie Underwood as their country inspiration.

These two artists are very popular and I really enjoy Keith and Carrie, they’re great performers, however I would not consider them to be inspiration for a band who call themselves COUNTRY…. I mean if you’re looking for a modern country inspiration, even Tim McGraw or Martina McBride, I believe, are better country aspirations.

But then again, this may just be me being picky.

By: Carson

Carson — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 05:41:42 +0000

I love Taylor Swift, however with her and her label repeating, “Country always comes first, they’ll get the singles first, etc.”, they better starting showing some of that…and I think Taylor should go back a bit in her roots. She’ll be in the Hannah Montana Movie (think of that as you wish), and in the movie Miley Cyrus goes back to Tennessee to learn about her country roots…something Taylor Swift should do herself. She’s dated a Jonas Brother, became friends with the Disney kids, and died on CSI…in the words of Jewel, “The rest is rock n’ roll cliche/I hit the bottom when I reached the top.”

I think Taylor is deeply talented, but if she wants to keep her country crowd and fans, she better start showing her country side more respect. The pop mixes are downright terrible. Disgusting. She remixed some of her singles from her debut album for her internation release, and these international songs are SO much better than the pop mixes, however her country songs/originals have so many pop country influences that no pop mixes are needed and it’s encouraging because for the international release, none of the songs off “Fearless” were remixed, hopefully signaling no more pop remixes for her new singles from this album.

If the pop crowd didn’t like Taylor, they wouldn’t have helped her sell 3 million copies of her debut CD, a CD that was just COUNTRY.

I do have to give props to Carrie Underwood, even though I prefer Taylor Swift over her, maybe because of my teeny-bopper age, but Carrie had a HUGE hit with SOO much crossover hits on country and top 40 and pop, and there was no remixing, just 100% original that they played on country radio, and what’s sad is that this song that was a huge hit on pop radio has more country in it then one of Taylor’s country songs.

Taylor has even said she would love for one of her songs to be a bridge to a rap song *shakes head in disappointment*

But, like I expressed, Taylor has to pay more respect to her roots and her country fans. Saying this all, I am a majorly huge Taylor fan despite my somewhat disagreement with some of her current pop songs and remixes, and I’m definitely seeing her in concert this summer.

By: Steve from Boston

Steve from Boston — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 05:29:54 +0000

Emily,

I have a slightly different take on it.

As someone who favors the Traditonal sound, I also have a big problem with male artists like Rascall Flatts and Keith Urban and the whole crop of new country boys who sound more like Justin TImberlake than they do George Jones. They sound very pop, and Keith and RF utterly dominate the awards shows. I think they are talented (especially Keith) but I just don’t think they are very country. So it’s not just the female singers that I blame for the watering down of Country music today. These guys had a lot to do with it as well.

But there does seem to be a double standard in this day and age…female artists pretty much HAVE to sound pop to succeed in todays country market and to get any air time on country radio and TV…Carrie, Taylor, and earlier Faith, Martina, and Shania…all pretty much sing country pop, and all have had great sucess doing so. At the same time, Traditionalists like Patty Loveless, Kathy Mattea, and even Leeann Womack to some degree, struggle for sales and airtime under current circumstances. Sara Evans started out with a real Traditional sound, and went nowhere until she released her country pop song No Place That Far, and then her very strong pop flavored album Born to Fly. I’m not happy about this situation at all, but I certainly don’t blame the ladies, they are doing what they have to to succeed in the present market. I don’t understand why the market(the public), media programers, producers and managers all expect the ladies to be pop singers.

The men, on the other hand, are much more widely accepted then the ladies are when they stick to their Traditonal inclinations. NeoTraditonalists Alan Jackson, George Strait and Brad Paisley, for example, can (and do) succeed right along with pop-country singers like Keith Urban and Rascall Flatts. There is a real double standard here, and I don’t like it and do not understand it at all. I’m glad the guys CAN succeed as Traditonalists if they choose, I just wish the ladies had that same option open to them.

By: arw

arw — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 04:01:44 +0000

sheesh…by some of the comments one would think the start of country pop started with shania. read a list of the country hits of the 70.s and 80′s and you would see the same mix of 3-chord country vs. the softer more pop-ier stuff of the time. but the whole thing goes even further back. how about some history, facts and truth before we start proclaiming the death of country music at the hands of carrie and taylor. interesting no one has mentioned sugarland????

By: Dan Milliken

Dan Milliken — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 00:12:16 +0000

dudley,

I forgot about that one, but I’m glad you brought it up. That was awful, especially for an event as momentous the Kennedy Center honors. I can’t figure out what was going through their heads – is Shania such a bad live singer that she couldn’t handle it at all, or was her voice just screwed up that day?

That said, I do really love the studio version of that cover on the Dolly tribute album.

By: TejasNina

TejasNina — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 00:02:13 +0000

You’re right on Canadian Boy (and I didn’t find that sexist). I think Rascal Flatts remixed “what hurts the most” as a single for pop, but that’s all that comes to mind in recent years. It was a smash hit anyway.Of course the same “they aren’t that country to begin with” argument applies to them same as Carrie Underwood et al. but they never deny that they are crossover, genre-blending artists. They even came up with the term “flatt-erizing.” They don’t pretend to be anything they’re not I don’t think, and I appreciate that.

By: Canadian Boy

Canadian Boy — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 20:35:36 +0000

Emily_T,
Well I CAN’T speak on behalf of everyone how has posted their opinion, I think that most of us don’t actually have a problem with country-pop, I personally enjoy country-pop, it’s just that we don’t like when country artisit release pop remixes of their songs. I don’t mean to sound sexist but it seems like female country artists tend to release pop remixes of their songs a lot more than male country artists. If you know any male country artist who release pop remixes of their songs then by all means they should be getting as much criticsm as the female country artists who have been put ibnto the spotlight of this conversation.

By: Emily_T

Emily_T — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 19:34:21 +0000

i dont understand why people make such a big deal about the country females make a song that might sound alittle country-pop and not traditinal country , but why are people not making a big deal about the male country singer that sing country-pop
just a thought
I LOVE CARRIE