George Harrison got sued many years ago cause “My Sweet Lord” sounded just like a song from one of the girl groups of the sixties. George lost.

“Toto… we’re not in Nashville anymore.”

I have to say that your claims regarding Carrie fans really can easily be turned back around on Taylor fans as well. As one who’s not a loyal fan of either, I’ve noticed that both sides do what you’re solely attributing to Underwood fans. Both sides seem equally culpable on that front.

Leann, I aggree that both artist’s fans do this, as well as several other current popular artists that have no where near the online fan base that either Carrie or Taylor have. I read and frequent forums of Carrie, Taylor, Miranda, Shania and many more, just as observer, because I find it very interesting how fandom works. I enjoy music from all of the artists I mention, and my biggest support usually goes to the one(s) that are the biggest underdogs at the moment.

The reason I talked about Carrie’s fan base is because from the different main messageboards for her fans, compared to others like Taylor, they have by far the most organized system for voting. No other fan base comes close to it. I suspect the main reason is because when she was on American idol, voting meant pretty much everything as to how far any of the contestants went, and after she won and entered the country music mainstream, that organization and fan base continued to grow. I think Carrie has worked very hard and earned a large part of her success, but I also see the influence of that organized fanbase in how quickly and how often she gets to the top in everything from online polls to country music charts to award wins.

Taylor also has a huge online fanbase, but the difference between those fan bases is in part how Taylor’s fans vote vs how Carrie’s fans vote. I think Taylor reaches a wider range of people online and has a bigger fan base but they are not concentrated, and the majority of those are not forum fans and participate in voting etc in a random manner, not in a dedicated every day planned strategy.

Miranda has a very loyal and dedicated fan base too, but it is much much smaller and has much less impact than either Taylor or Carrie’s.

I’m most of all interested in how all of this works, because obviously radio popularity in country music and in every other form of media is much different than it was even 5 years ago.

I have to say I’m kind of disappointed in both Carrie and Taylor as far as the direction of their music. I think both have unique musical abilities and have the ability to bring a ton of exposure to country music, but both seem to be developing strong pop leanings and are infusing a lot more pop elements into their music, which kind of depreciates any good that might come of bringing worldwide attention to country music and giving it more listeners. I actually think that if both of them and the rest of the popular artists today would build their songs in a more traditional manner, leave in banjo, mandolin, steel guitar, fiddle etc. and take out the drums and electric guitars and synths and all the other pop and rock elements, (or at least cut them way down) Country would show itself as a much stronger and more influential and credible format. All the pop and rock in the songs today seems to take away their emotional impact for me.

Thanks for anyone that read this and understand what I’m trying to say.

This makes no sense. A song cannot go #1 on the support of a faithful core fan base. See, e.g., every single by Miranda Lambert. Broad-based appeal will drive a song to #1.

Knightwalker continues: “. . . and because radio country music are part of the industry and the industry is going to continue to promote her just like other radio artists as long as they can get mileage out of her.”

Knightwalker had one thing right, i.e., country music is an “industry”. It’s not a non-profit organization; it’s a for-profit business. And a for-profit business would be foolish not to promote songs of an artist the public likes.

Grade C+

September 22, 2009 at 5:48 pm
“I think one of the reasons Cowboy Casanova has risen so quickly on the charts is the online Carrie superfans have become even more organized and more determined to push everything she does in every way they can. I’ve observed their fan forums for some time, and they are the most organized online fan base of any artist, making threads for everything they can find to set up ways to vote on radio, various awards shows, and even random online contests for appearance and fashion on remote blogs and magazines. Many of them seem to have a hatred of anything done by Swift because they see it as a threat to Carrie, and her recent success and major press coverage has fueled that hatred and fueled the Carrie fans to be even more fanatic. I find it amusing and also sad that people go to such lengths to build of fake popularity for any artist, and it says a lot about the poor state of our music industry that these tactics work. I enjoy many Carrie songs, but the song Cowboy Cassanova has very little appeal to me, and to most of the people I’ve worked with and talked with that hear it when it comes on the radio. I’m sure it will go #1 though, because of the core base of Carrie faithful and because radio country music are part of the industry and the industry is going to continue to promote her just like other radio artists as long as they can get mileage out of her.”

I suspected as much…but I think Leeann makes a good point too, I suspect the same with Taylor fans…but from the admittedly limited amount that I have observed, the Carrie fans seem to dislike Taylor more than the other way around. And it is actually Carrie who wins almost every single poll she’s mentioned in, not Taylor. Evidence of even more fervent fan organization, I believe.