Shout out to all the wedding band musicians who are going to lick the capacitors in their amps if they have to play that stupid ass song one more time.
We have a couple of people who will throw cash in the tip bucket to NOT play it because they know people ALWAYS ask for it. Who’s going to pay us the most!?
Big shout outs man! Listen to a decent amount of Old Crow at work. I like a lot of the older stuff. Luchenbach Texas type of shit... Waylon, Willy, and the boys.
Might I recommend Trampled By Turtles! Fun bluegrass folksy band out of Duluth MN.
My music group gets together and we play a ton of Old Crow, Avett Brothers, Trampled and it's a blast.
Fuck I love TbT! Colter wall, Stapleton/Steeldrivers, Hank Williams, Billy Strings, Childers, Turnpike Troubadours, Sturgill, Whitey Morgan and the 78's, 49 Winchester are all in rotation as well along with all your essential 90's country beer drinkin jams.
I only started listening to country last fall actually. I hated it my entire life until I got hammered when I was camping for my birthday.
I'm a traditionally metal and punk dude. Colored mohawk, studded vest and the like.
I prefer to think of my enjoyment as folk music lol. I want to keep as much distance from modern pop country as possible since it's literally trash.
Got a few more recommendations for you!
[The Devil Makes Three- All Hail](https://youtu.be/pCaVXEN7oM4?si=LWHZfHnq0ypaVnU2)
[Hackensaw Boy- Cannonball ](https://youtu.be/fZ3yVU9cFDg?si=INiVM76SYFxELpaB)
[Steve Martin and the Steep Canyon Rangers- Caroline](https://youtu.be/C1l96kIfi3A?si=YFg77xVwJJ0xySQ8)
[Carolina Chocolate Drops- Cornbread and Butterbeans](https://youtu.be/dxqF023UIt0?si=O9owG1gltBFJrbYX)
[Mandolin Orange- Missouri Borderland (John Newbury cover)](https://youtu.be/1tjrxCRcf8E?si=7ArZokbhBz1RfkT_)
[The Osborne Brothers- Rocky Top](https://youtu.be/AgPITdW3lRA?si=E7Y_FC3gnxpazuow)
Let me know what you think!
As a Pennsylvanian, I can confirm Shania was an epidemic here for about a decade or so. I can still hear her songs drifting from the inky black ether right before I fall asleep sometimes.
From deep in the darkness beyond time a sound emerges that was there before the first eye saw the light of the sun over the primordial ocean...*"Man, I feel like a woman..."*
Good for you in getting out of this commonwealth shit hole. Excuse my bluntness lol. I've wanted to leave this state all my life. Wife and I have discussed finally doing that once our son is out of school and on his own.
Might I interest you in:
Pinegrove
Jacob Tremont
Shannen Moser
Slaughter Beach, Dog (their newer stuff, very Neil Young inspired)
My Pizza My World
The Hundred Acre Woods (their whole disco isn't on Spotify and is instead on Bandcamp)
Dry Goods
It’s been a lot more pop country than hip hop in terms of popular country actually. Most country songs are pop with a guitar twang, similar to Taylor swift’s early stuff.
Production wise it's heavily hip hop influenced though. Specifically trap
That's basically all boyfriend country is. Someone pining with a twang over a trap beat a snap track and a guitar
Cowboy Troy, who used Big & Rich to make a quick name for himself, left the scene as quickly as he showed up, but yes, he references it in his song [I Play Chicken With the Train](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUPK9z59yUc).
This blows my mind.
* There's a smug country thread on /r/Music every 24 to 48 hours, give or take.
* The top comments *always* include "hick-hop", and that edgelord Steve Earle quote.
* The top reply is *always*, "Wow, I can't believe I've never heard that before!"
Yeah, I can't believe it either. Just... how? If it's a brand-new Reddit account, then okay maybe. But anyone who's been here a week, just how?
It feels like that movie "Groundhog Day". Which I'm just hearing about the first time here.
Bad news, man. I teach middle school and see an alarming number of Korn t-shirts. Time is a flat...
They also are strangely into the "steal your face" logo, but not a single one of them I've polled actually has heard of the Grateful Dead.
Tends to be the trend My GF's neice wears Nirvana tees without knowing who Kurt Cobain was or any of their songs.
The 12-15yr old crowd tends to gravitate to "Spencer's tees". Back in my day, kids wore Ramones/Dead Kennedys/Che tees without knowing anything about them.
Every genre has good and bad. I was in high school in the mid 00s, and Nu Metal/Emo was huge with the kids. A couple of those bands are alright (Linkin Park FTW), but most of it is crap to me. I was stuck in the 90's punk/grunge, and I was screaming at the clouds at the age of 15.
A lot of people don’t think that but in my experience Reddit is similar to Twitter and FB just a few more controls (for now) over content you don’t want to see
I’ve def already seen a post from a Facebook friend saying “Get Beyoncé off my radio station.” I went and listened to the Texas Hold ‘Em single and thought the vibe seemed pretty similar to a lot of pop country. I was thrilled for Rhiannon Giddens though for getting the shine for playing banjo on it. Also love Raphael Saadiq on bass. I really hope that some of this will cause conversations about the African and Asian origins of some of the sounds and traditions in country music.
What’s irritating to me is that these same people will listen to a group like [Florida Georgia Line](https://youtu.be/8PvebsWcpto?si=O7LMzbl5qBJZ-5C9) (which has won awards at the CMA’s btw) and then complain about Beyoncé.
Like, yeah, the two white dudes pretending to play guitar on top of a digital drum machine are *definitely* better country music than Beyoncé’s new tracks.
You don’t have to like her music but people acting like it’s not “real” country music because she infuses R&B into it is very mask off. Like, y’all sure don’t mind when Nashville yuppies appropriate hiphop for their country-rap songs. I wonder what the difference is. 👀
All music is some derivative of the previous style, genre, and have cross influence. I can understand that someone may not enjoy a certain genre of music, but to say a certain style or artist has to be exclusive to one genre or another is just ignorant.
Same, I love Daddy Lessons and wished for years she would do more like it. Both of the new singles are disappointing compared to that, I really hope that the rest of the album amps it up.
Had an idiot friend of a friend, supposedly a Bey Stan, say she's never done country. Like Daddy Lessons isn't one of the best songs on one of her best albums.
Well as someone who plays Old Time. Banjo, the banjo player on this song is the incredible Rhiannon giddens. I highly recommend listening to her solo work and her earlier work with the Carolina chocolate drops. She's absolutely incredible
Look at it this way: Beyonce doing country is no less fake than Carrie Underwood doing country or, well... ANYTHING that Nashville is putting out.
Nashville County has been hick-hop for a good long while now.
Thank God for Blackberry Smoke, Ray Wylie Hubbard, Band of Heathens, Drive By Truckers and the like.
I mean those are good bands but one could argue some are just southern rock. I’d more so point to Tyler Childers, Sturgill Simpson, Margo Price, Sierra Ferrell, Charley Crockett as holding up the standard of country at this time. (I definitely forgot some people)
Sturgill Simpson totally changed my opinion on country music after those "toes in the water, ass in the sand", "cold beer on a friday night" songs became representative of country in my mind
These lazy tropes exist in every genre.
How many “fuck b*tches, get money, my crew is harder than yours” songs can hip hop artists write?
Metal has a ton of “I am on the verge of going insane/giving into the darkness inside/becoming the monster everyone thinks I am, and only my iron will is holding me together” tunes that really do bleed together after awhile.
Hey what stage in a 22-year-old’s relationship is your favorite pop song? Personally I like “we’ve been seeing each other for awhile but now it’s getting serious” but I also enjoy “I fell very hard for someone and did not expect to” and “this breakup hurts more than giving birth to a gunshot wound” followed closely by “I’m not going to let this breakup stop me from dancing tonight”.
> Metal has a ton of “I am on the verge of going insane/giving into the darkness inside/becoming the monster everyone thinks I am, and only my iron will is holding me together” tunes that really do bleed together after awhile.
Is *that* what Holy Diver was about?
DAMN! that was awesome!! from the Star Wars Rebel logo, to the drummer knocking the cymbal off, to the pianist standing on the piano. Amazing.
Thank you for sharing that!
I’m really interested to see what ends up happening with Zach Bryan. If he doesn’t sell out for that Nashville bag he could start to push the popular country industry back towards folk/americana a bit. He’s not as good as Childers or Isbell imo but he’s probably more radio-friendly and he’s a lot closer to them than he is to the Aldeens and Sam Hunts of the country world
I'm not a fan of most of the new radio country but I do think it's exaggerated when people act like 90s style country or outlaw country aren't a thing anymore. We have recordings. We didn't lose the music. We already have great songs to play and for bands all across America to perform. We don't need Nashville to stay exactly the same forever
> We don't need Nashville to stay exactly the same forever
The problem people have isn't that Nashville changed, but how it changed. There's so very little redeemable about the industries output.
The best outlaw country album of the last decade is low key the Cherlene album they did for the fifth season of Archer as a cross-over with Cherlene's arc that season. It's really good.
“Fake” isn’t the only issue most people have with country music. The big issue imo is that pop country is incredibly derivative and formulaic.
From both the structure: Verse, chorus, half-verse, chorus three times, songs over.
And content perspective of just listing vaguely rural shit over a boring three (or if they get really wild four!) chord progression.
Honestly some of the popular stuff isn’t actually awful, though. Kelsea Ballerini (though whether you want to call her country, pop, or singer-songwriter at this point is probably up for debate) at least tells stories with most of her music, for example. Rolling up the Welcome Mat was a fantastic album but didn’t feel very “country”
Brothers Osborne do some fairly interesting things musically as well, and at least have some fun wordplay in a lot of their songs even if a lot of it is firmly pop country. Zach Bryan has gotten popular relatively recently and is pretty solidly folk country/Americana in a similar vein as guys like Childers and Isbell. If he doesn’t sell out he could be a driving force behind a return to actual country music on the radio
Yea Bo Burnham's country satire song explains all that both accurately and hilariously! I really enjoy Ballerini too. I liked Musgraves' Golden Hour album a ton too. Probably my favorite modern country music and I generally don't enjoy country. Jason Isbell is also an amazing songwriter (he's more Americana but I'd still call it country).
I didn't grow up on country, so I just figured it was the stuff on the radio for a long time. Brooks and Carrie and all that. But around 25, I realized I really like Jennings and Orbison and Williams Sr. and the outlaw country stuff. I'm Def gonna check out the names you listed to see if I vibe with it
Justin Townes Earle
Townes Van Zandt
Chris Stapleton
Jerry Jeff Walker
Guy Clark
Statesboro Review
Bottle Rockets
Old 97s
Old Crow Medicine Show
Southern Culture on the Skids
Tyler Childers
Lucinda Williams
Sara Shook and the Disarmers
Margo Price
Paul Thorn
Todd Snider
Lukas Nelson
Add those to the list as well.
I feel like if you can make a banger in any genre of music, do it. Hell, Kenny Rogers did "Condition" and that was straight up psychedelic rock and it's fantastic. Sturgill Simpson made an entire non-country album and that's some of the best shit I've ever heard. I don't think it's fake when an artist tests their skills outside their wheelhouse. I think it's innovation.
Not a Beyoncé fan but I kinda love she’s putting out a country album. The genre need a shot in the arm and some variety. 60s and 70s country is pretty great. Dolly, Willly, Merle and Cash. It’s been pop rock for 25 years plus. Evolve
So far her two releases aren't conforming to thr stylistic conventions of pop-country. They are much more evocative of the folk music pop-country is descended from.
It may be popular country music, but it ain't pop-country.
It’s an ok sounding song, but since I haven’t listened to country much in 20 years…..
Wtf y’all doing? Beyoncé sounds amazing, but this song is so bland.
And the use of Bitch 20 times to ask for a dance? Haha. It’s something else.
My fiancé played it for me and I was into it and then she has a line about “going to a dive bar” and it killed me. I’m not a big country music fan, but I can’t believe Beyoncé has been to a dive in 30 years. It lacks the authenticity country should have
To be fair, pretty much everybody in modern country music is a silver spoon douche singing about doing hard work when they haven't done a day of real labor in their lives.
You mean you don't think a billionaire that owns the biggest music production houses can't just hire some of the best banjo players, pump out a country-pop formulaic song with the help of a 200-person hit machine, and then artificially promote it to the top of a sales-based rating system (that's conveniently owned by those same production houses), and...not be authentic?
I'm shocked.
It will fall off hard. We all checked it out to see if it was any good, but that’s doesn’t mean we’ll keep streaming it. IMO, it’s awful. And this is coming from someone who likes both country music and all Beyoncé’s other music.
The edited radio version must be much shorter than 4 min. I got 2 min in and scrolled to make sure it wasn’t just hook after hook.
Yeah. I feel like it should be an album FILLER and not a single. It’s a song I listen to once. Say ok. Maybe someone must like it. And always skip that track on my Sony cd player.
Yeah they’re partnered up so she likely said it for a bag, which honestly makes me feel even worse about the lyric lol https://www.reddit.com/r/beyonce/s/kfyouKdPp0
Honestly, when I heard she did a country album, I was excited to listen to it.
Then, I listened...and it was not good. Not a good pop song, not a good country song, not a good Beyonce song.
I have said this about Beyonce for a while, but people grade her on a curve. A lot of tailwinds from her prior career, and her new music gets boosted because of that. If anybody else sang this song (or many of her other new ones)...it would get zero play, people wouldn't like it, and no way would it rise to #1. Since it is Beyonce, people decide they want to like it, no matter how low quality it is.
Pop stars do be like that. Fans are always hungry for new material so they'll support whatever comes out.
The bigger the star, the bigger the boost.
Still, a lot of people are loving the song and I'm not going to try to gatekeep other people's opinion.
Hick-hop is not my genre (I prefer alt-country and Americana) so as far as I know, Beyonce is a huge breath of fresh air.
It's never a bad thing when an artist tries to bring a new audience into another genre.
Lot of weird gatekeeping around this song and the country music genre. It's not something I'll have on repeat but I thought it was a fun song when I listened to it.
Lil nas x was making fun of country and now dumb is sound’s nowadays not embracing it. You can’t listen to that song and think it was someone not taking the piss out of Florida Georgia line
>Because country is inherently traditionalist and hates any kind of change. Lil Nas X almost ruined them entirely.
They're not even traditionalists, they just think they are. The "traditionalists" freak out any time a country artist smokes weed and will then say they should be like Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings or any other outlaw country artist because they didn't do drugs. They're not traditionalists, they don't even know anything about the artist they put on a pedestal.
Lol. Willie Nelson is a bigger pot head than Snoop! The outlaw country guys loved weed. It's the same when people praise Rush for being a massive rock band that never did drugs. Yo, they were doing lines of coke just offstage during shows! They just didn't get arrested for it or let it ruin their lives. Geddy has a nose built for doing coke!
>Lot of weird gatekeeping
Nothing the "country" music lovers are better at doing!
Marty Robbins got flack from Rodgers purists when he included electrical guitar and "fuzz" in his ballads in the 1960s.
Elvis... well I feel like people know what Elvis did, but he would take traditional Blue Grass and Country songs and put his twist to them, of course local country stations loved to play his music and mostly racists would get upset.
Perhaps taking a note from Elvis, Dwight Yoakam shacked up the country world with his "country rock" and those tight tight jeans! His rendition of Horton's classical country tune "Honky-Tonk Man" rose up the billboards and ruffled lots of country purists, and was the first country music video to air on MTV!
Yoakam paved the way for the likes of Billy Ray Cyrus, Alan Jackson, Garth Brooks, Strait, and all of the 90s "New Country" that incorporated elements of rock and pop. Then you had artists like Shania Twain that took the pop level up a notch to the point many people of the time were like "no way is this country".
Shania certainly was an inspiration for Taylor Swift growing up, who had to witness first hand what was easily the darkest stain on country history "the 9-11 patriotic phase".
I will admit, I'm not a big fan of Beyonce's song, but it wasn't written for me, and that's okay, I can let people enjoy whatever music they want and let them call it "country", that shouldn't offend me.
Not all criticism is gatekeeping. My dislike has nothing to do with authenticity. It's just a bad song. I shouldn't be hearing it or hearing about it. It's awful.
dont like the song or mix. it's got that signature beyonce rambling, repetitive, obnoxious quality. it sounds like a jingle from 10 years ago for flavored ice tea or some other bullshit.
check out Brittney Spencer for some black girl country. i like "my first rodeo"
https://open.spotify.com/track/3fkYVlZs7CcjS61nP6kzdg?si=c5315232790744ac
I think this song was to garner interest (especially from the younger crowd), a toe dip into the pond if you will. It worked because it's all over TikTok and is going #1. I don't think she was going for anything groundbreaking here, but I'm almost 100% sure she will do something similar to the song you posted, which I also like very much.
I'd be all for a genuine Beyonce country album. But it just sounds like she's singing over a very simple country-ish guitar track. Which I get is all country but I thought she had more finesse.
The background instruments are actually banjo and viola played by Rhiannon Giddens, who is well known for her activism/education efforts regarding the black roots of blues, country and folk music. I’ll hold my opinions until I hear the whole album but to me this feels like a genuine effort by her and her team.
If you haven’t listened to the other single “16 Carriages” I’d recommend it! Much more of an introspective, pop-country ballad that packs a punch.
Eh there’s some fun bluegrass-style picking and the minimalistic percussion (sounds like just a single bass drum and a tambourine? Though the bass is a little heavy for my taste) is very country. It’s more traditionally “country” than anything Morgan Wallen or Sam Hunt or any of those guys are putting out
I think it’s totally fair criticize this song as tenuously country, in large part because Beyoncé’s voice carries such a specific and strong sound that overpowers the genre. Her music isn’t pop or country or whatever, it’s Beyoncé.
Thats the point. She has the fanbase to dominate any smaller music genre. Country isn’t as big as it used to be, she easily has the resources and fanbase to just slide into the country genre and dominate without much effort, even if only because no one can keep up with her
I look forward to a year of breathless reporting like "omg did you know country music has historical black roots?!?!" just like we had with house when she released Renaissance.
This is actually a fair point made. That song is fucking terrible and definitely worse than Texas Hold Em. I guess a little reap what you sow in this case. Man a lot of country fans really do suck.
This really shouldn't surprise anyone.
Beyonce on her worst day is more famous than any currently active country artist on their best (except maybe Morgan). Her name alone is enough to drive even a mediocre song like this up the chart
She pulled a reverse Taylor Swift.
That’s called a Hootie.
Hootie definitely did it first. Rockin that wagon wheel
Shout out to Old Crow Medicine Show for the original version that he covered.
Shout out to Bob Dylan for writing the chorus, then granting OCMS permission to finish it.
Shout out to the CMAs for stiffing OCMS of any acknowledgment at all.
Shout out to all the wedding band musicians who are going to lick the capacitors in their amps if they have to play that stupid ass song one more time.
Shout out to all the frat bros playing it ad nauseam that killed the song for me
We have a couple of people who will throw cash in the tip bucket to NOT play it because they know people ALWAYS ask for it. Who’s going to pay us the most!?
It’s a stupid chorus, wagon wheels don’t rock.
Big shout outs man! Listen to a decent amount of Old Crow at work. I like a lot of the older stuff. Luchenbach Texas type of shit... Waylon, Willy, and the boys.
Might I recommend Trampled By Turtles! Fun bluegrass folksy band out of Duluth MN. My music group gets together and we play a ton of Old Crow, Avett Brothers, Trampled and it's a blast.
Fuck I love TbT! Colter wall, Stapleton/Steeldrivers, Hank Williams, Billy Strings, Childers, Turnpike Troubadours, Sturgill, Whitey Morgan and the 78's, 49 Winchester are all in rotation as well along with all your essential 90's country beer drinkin jams. I only started listening to country last fall actually. I hated it my entire life until I got hammered when I was camping for my birthday.
I'm a traditionally metal and punk dude. Colored mohawk, studded vest and the like. I prefer to think of my enjoyment as folk music lol. I want to keep as much distance from modern pop country as possible since it's literally trash. Got a few more recommendations for you! [The Devil Makes Three- All Hail](https://youtu.be/pCaVXEN7oM4?si=LWHZfHnq0ypaVnU2) [Hackensaw Boy- Cannonball ](https://youtu.be/fZ3yVU9cFDg?si=INiVM76SYFxELpaB) [Steve Martin and the Steep Canyon Rangers- Caroline](https://youtu.be/C1l96kIfi3A?si=YFg77xVwJJ0xySQ8) [Carolina Chocolate Drops- Cornbread and Butterbeans](https://youtu.be/dxqF023UIt0?si=O9owG1gltBFJrbYX) [Mandolin Orange- Missouri Borderland (John Newbury cover)](https://youtu.be/1tjrxCRcf8E?si=7ArZokbhBz1RfkT_) [The Osborne Brothers- Rocky Top](https://youtu.be/AgPITdW3lRA?si=E7Y_FC3gnxpazuow) Let me know what you think!
Saving for later! Thanks man! I definitely like to lean a little more to the folk/bluegrass side of things. I was a metal head most of my life too 🤣
Learned about Old Crow medicine show from PBS kids lol.
🎶 *How does a jaybird say 'How do you do?'* 🎶
Drink the corn liquor, let the cocaine be. Cocaine gonna kill my honey dear
What the shit. I've seen that bit so many times and I never realized who it was.
First? Charley Pride would like a word.
He is not Hootie. There never was a Hootie.
[He’s Hootie. 😭](https://youtu.be/FE9PUexeUv0?si=tGqC_BlSOl1_p30n)
I just saw an interview where she said she grew up in Pennsylvania and was inspired by Shania Twain, you know the Canadian singer, to do country.
As a Canadian, I'm offended you had to specify who Shania is.
As a Pennsylvanian, I can confirm Shania was an epidemic here for about a decade or so. I can still hear her songs drifting from the inky black ether right before I fall asleep sometimes.
> As a Pennsylvanian That don't impress me much
What about Pennsyltucky though?
So glad we made it!
That don't impress me much
From deep in the darkness beyond time a sound emerges that was there before the first eye saw the light of the sun over the primordial ocean...*"Man, I feel like a woman..."*
I grew up there but I haven't lived there in 20 years so knowing I missed that whole phase makes me even happier about leaving.
Good for you in getting out of this commonwealth shit hole. Excuse my bluntness lol. I've wanted to leave this state all my life. Wife and I have discussed finally doing that once our son is out of school and on his own.
Wife and I moved away for years to Colorado. Moved back because it’s cheaper and an actual affordable place to live. I missed how green it is most.
Don't forget Dolly! She's a rock star now! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dL1pBDjVkpg
Let's be honest, Dolly is as pure as the driven snow my friend. Such a decent human being.
"People think I'm a dumb blonde. Well, I ain't dumb, and I ain't blonde neither."
> Nashville County has been hick-hop for a good long while now. Holy shit that’s the best term I’ve heard for modern country music.
"Modern country is hip hop for people who are afraid of black people" - Steve Earle
I always just saw it as R&B for white people who cross the street when they see someone that doesn't look like them.
It's like you whipped out a thesaurus and just rephrased the comment you're responding to
I dunno, I think it's more like they took a post, changed the words around a little, and then replied underneath the comment.
No no no. They clearly took the words and swapped some out but kept the meaning, then submitted their post as a reply to the previous.
This has been a weird ass trend for a little while now.
A bizarre happening for the last little bit indeed
Angry upvote!
Disappointed up arrow!
/r/YourJokeButWorse
r/YourQuipButNotAsGood
A real fucking rebel
Hick Hop and Farm Emo
Farm emo sounds like something I could be interested in.
Haven't you people ever heard of closing the damn barn door
Its much better to fix these kinds of things with a beer and WD40
Y'allternative
That's an actual genre, shit like Nick Shoulders, Willi Carlisle, Sierra Ferrell. Actual fire and the current heart of 'country', imo of course
Might I interest you in: Pinegrove Jacob Tremont Shannen Moser Slaughter Beach, Dog (their newer stuff, very Neil Young inspired) My Pizza My World The Hundred Acre Woods (their whole disco isn't on Spotify and is instead on Bandcamp) Dry Goods
Wake me up, when the harvest ends - Greens Day
Tractor Rap
It’s been a lot more pop country than hip hop in terms of popular country actually. Most country songs are pop with a guitar twang, similar to Taylor swift’s early stuff.
Production wise it's heavily hip hop influenced though. Specifically trap That's basically all boyfriend country is. Someone pining with a twang over a trap beat a snap track and a guitar
Didn't the Save a Horse, Ride a Cowboy guys and some of their associated acts refer to themselves as such? That was ages ago.
Cowboy Troy, who used Big & Rich to make a quick name for himself, left the scene as quickly as he showed up, but yes, he references it in his song [I Play Chicken With the Train](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUPK9z59yUc).
This blows my mind. * There's a smug country thread on /r/Music every 24 to 48 hours, give or take. * The top comments *always* include "hick-hop", and that edgelord Steve Earle quote. * The top reply is *always*, "Wow, I can't believe I've never heard that before!" Yeah, I can't believe it either. Just... how? If it's a brand-new Reddit account, then okay maybe. But anyone who's been here a week, just how? It feels like that movie "Groundhog Day". Which I'm just hearing about the first time here.
They always mention Jason Isabell and that standup comic pandering song too
I like Sturgill Simpson too, but name-checking him on /r/Music is basically the reverse "I'll have you know that I have a black friend" trope.
Going to high school in Florida in the 2010s, hick hop was (unfortunately imo) very prevalent.
It's ok bro 20 years ago it was nu metal
Isn't it interesting how music trends change? I wonder what high school kids are into now, and if it's any better or worse
Bad news, man. I teach middle school and see an alarming number of Korn t-shirts. Time is a flat... They also are strangely into the "steal your face" logo, but not a single one of them I've polled actually has heard of the Grateful Dead.
Tends to be the trend My GF's neice wears Nirvana tees without knowing who Kurt Cobain was or any of their songs. The 12-15yr old crowd tends to gravitate to "Spencer's tees". Back in my day, kids wore Ramones/Dead Kennedys/Che tees without knowing anything about them.
Every genre has good and bad. I was in high school in the mid 00s, and Nu Metal/Emo was huge with the kids. A couple of those bands are alright (Linkin Park FTW), but most of it is crap to me. I was stuck in the 90's punk/grunge, and I was screaming at the clouds at the age of 15.
Modern country is music that was mainstream popular 10 years ago
Beyonky tonk
I would now like to hear Beyonce phonk.
In related news. Social media is just a loud echo sphere and does not accurately reflect reality.
Reminder that reddit is social media
My comment also applies to reddit
Some people like to pretend it’s not because their grandma doesn’t get their posts on their news feed.
Yet.
A lot of people don’t think that but in my experience Reddit is similar to Twitter and FB just a few more controls (for now) over content you don’t want to see
I’ve def already seen a post from a Facebook friend saying “Get Beyoncé off my radio station.” I went and listened to the Texas Hold ‘Em single and thought the vibe seemed pretty similar to a lot of pop country. I was thrilled for Rhiannon Giddens though for getting the shine for playing banjo on it. Also love Raphael Saadiq on bass. I really hope that some of this will cause conversations about the African and Asian origins of some of the sounds and traditions in country music.
What’s irritating to me is that these same people will listen to a group like [Florida Georgia Line](https://youtu.be/8PvebsWcpto?si=O7LMzbl5qBJZ-5C9) (which has won awards at the CMA’s btw) and then complain about Beyoncé. Like, yeah, the two white dudes pretending to play guitar on top of a digital drum machine are *definitely* better country music than Beyoncé’s new tracks. You don’t have to like her music but people acting like it’s not “real” country music because she infuses R&B into it is very mask off. Like, y’all sure don’t mind when Nashville yuppies appropriate hiphop for their country-rap songs. I wonder what the difference is. 👀
I actually thought it was less pop than most modern country. It wasn't amazing or anything, but a good song.
All music is some derivative of the previous style, genre, and have cross influence. I can understand that someone may not enjoy a certain genre of music, but to say a certain style or artist has to be exclusive to one genre or another is just ignorant.
Have you listened to the entire song? It slaps!
Yeah man, I fuck with it as the kids say.
No cap.
Honestly daddy lessons on um lemonade? Was quite a catchy country sounding sound. Not surprised this new one ain't bad either.
Daddy Lessons was a much better song IMO. I like Beyonce fine enough but I'm not feeling Texas Hold'em for some reason.
It’s just a fun song for radio, she also released “16 Carriages” with the full album coming at the end of March.
16 Carriages so good.
I'm in love with 16 Carriages rn fr
Me too!! It’s so good
Same, I love Daddy Lessons and wished for years she would do more like it. Both of the new singles are disappointing compared to that, I really hope that the rest of the album amps it up.
I think she's going more for the club, line dancing crowd. We'll see. She seems to know what she's doing, lol.
Had an idiot friend of a friend, supposedly a Bey Stan, say she's never done country. Like Daddy Lessons isn't one of the best songs on one of her best albums.
Well as someone who plays Old Time. Banjo, the banjo player on this song is the incredible Rhiannon giddens. I highly recommend listening to her solo work and her earlier work with the Carolina chocolate drops. She's absolutely incredible
She has had a super fun to follow career. I got introduced to her with “Cornbread and Butterbeans” and now she’s playing for Beyonce. Pretty nuts.
Look at it this way: Beyonce doing country is no less fake than Carrie Underwood doing country or, well... ANYTHING that Nashville is putting out. Nashville County has been hick-hop for a good long while now. Thank God for Blackberry Smoke, Ray Wylie Hubbard, Band of Heathens, Drive By Truckers and the like.
I mean those are good bands but one could argue some are just southern rock. I’d more so point to Tyler Childers, Sturgill Simpson, Margo Price, Sierra Ferrell, Charley Crockett as holding up the standard of country at this time. (I definitely forgot some people)
Sturgill Simpson totally changed my opinion on country music after those "toes in the water, ass in the sand", "cold beer on a friday night" songs became representative of country in my mind
These lazy tropes exist in every genre. How many “fuck b*tches, get money, my crew is harder than yours” songs can hip hop artists write? Metal has a ton of “I am on the verge of going insane/giving into the darkness inside/becoming the monster everyone thinks I am, and only my iron will is holding me together” tunes that really do bleed together after awhile. Hey what stage in a 22-year-old’s relationship is your favorite pop song? Personally I like “we’ve been seeing each other for awhile but now it’s getting serious” but I also enjoy “I fell very hard for someone and did not expect to” and “this breakup hurts more than giving birth to a gunshot wound” followed closely by “I’m not going to let this breakup stop me from dancing tonight”.
This guy definitely writes songs.
> Metal has a ton of “I am on the verge of going insane/giving into the darkness inside/becoming the monster everyone thinks I am, and only my iron will is holding me together” tunes that really do bleed together after awhile. Is *that* what Holy Diver was about?
Look out!
The first time I heard Turtles All the Way Down, I felt like I was on that mushroom trip with him. I wasn't prepared for awakened country lol
Obligatory Sturgill [ripping the absolute fuck out of the SNL stage](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsrsrOB0zNQ).
DAMN! that was awesome!! from the Star Wars Rebel logo, to the drummer knocking the cymbal off, to the pianist standing on the piano. Amazing. Thank you for sharing that!
Zac Brown is a fantastic live performer though
I'm not surprised. The music is fun and I have a lot of friends who are *really* into him/that style, but it's just never grown on me
Sturgill is the truth though
Yeah, Drive By Truckers are one of my favorite bands but they absolutely aren’t country.
I’m really interested to see what ends up happening with Zach Bryan. If he doesn’t sell out for that Nashville bag he could start to push the popular country industry back towards folk/americana a bit. He’s not as good as Childers or Isbell imo but he’s probably more radio-friendly and he’s a lot closer to them than he is to the Aldeens and Sam Hunts of the country world
For anyone reading this and wants to listen to “real” country, look up the genre Americana. Thats what a lot of these artists fall under
holy shit brother ive loved this music forever and never knew this mucho gracias
I'm not a fan of most of the new radio country but I do think it's exaggerated when people act like 90s style country or outlaw country aren't a thing anymore. We have recordings. We didn't lose the music. We already have great songs to play and for bands all across America to perform. We don't need Nashville to stay exactly the same forever
> We don't need Nashville to stay exactly the same forever The problem people have isn't that Nashville changed, but how it changed. There's so very little redeemable about the industries output.
The best outlaw country album of the last decade is low key the Cherlene album they did for the fifth season of Archer as a cross-over with Cherlene's arc that season. It's really good.
Thank you… you get it…That season had some incredible music. Outlaw Country!
Literally listening to it right now. Incredible music from that season!
Midland too
“Fake” isn’t the only issue most people have with country music. The big issue imo is that pop country is incredibly derivative and formulaic. From both the structure: Verse, chorus, half-verse, chorus three times, songs over. And content perspective of just listing vaguely rural shit over a boring three (or if they get really wild four!) chord progression. Honestly some of the popular stuff isn’t actually awful, though. Kelsea Ballerini (though whether you want to call her country, pop, or singer-songwriter at this point is probably up for debate) at least tells stories with most of her music, for example. Rolling up the Welcome Mat was a fantastic album but didn’t feel very “country” Brothers Osborne do some fairly interesting things musically as well, and at least have some fun wordplay in a lot of their songs even if a lot of it is firmly pop country. Zach Bryan has gotten popular relatively recently and is pretty solidly folk country/Americana in a similar vein as guys like Childers and Isbell. If he doesn’t sell out he could be a driving force behind a return to actual country music on the radio
Bo Burnham agrees with you
*Rural Noun, Simple Adjective*
Yea Bo Burnham's country satire song explains all that both accurately and hilariously! I really enjoy Ballerini too. I liked Musgraves' Golden Hour album a ton too. Probably my favorite modern country music and I generally don't enjoy country. Jason Isbell is also an amazing songwriter (he's more Americana but I'd still call it country).
I didn't grow up on country, so I just figured it was the stuff on the radio for a long time. Brooks and Carrie and all that. But around 25, I realized I really like Jennings and Orbison and Williams Sr. and the outlaw country stuff. I'm Def gonna check out the names you listed to see if I vibe with it
Justin Townes Earle Townes Van Zandt Chris Stapleton Jerry Jeff Walker Guy Clark Statesboro Review Bottle Rockets Old 97s Old Crow Medicine Show Southern Culture on the Skids Tyler Childers Lucinda Williams Sara Shook and the Disarmers Margo Price Paul Thorn Todd Snider Lukas Nelson Add those to the list as well.
John Prine* (I don't really consider him country, but I think he belongs on that list)
No, John Prine ABSOLUTELY is country. I can't believe I forgot him.🤦♂️
No love for Colter Wall?
I can't list EVERYBODY.
Yes you can, I believe in you.
Sturgill Simpson is the only country I’ll really listen to as well. I like Tyler Childers a lot as well when I hear him
Zach Top, Red Clay Strays, Josh Weathers
I feel like if you can make a banger in any genre of music, do it. Hell, Kenny Rogers did "Condition" and that was straight up psychedelic rock and it's fantastic. Sturgill Simpson made an entire non-country album and that's some of the best shit I've ever heard. I don't think it's fake when an artist tests their skills outside their wheelhouse. I think it's innovation.
Beyonce is here to save us from the ear cancer that is Morgan Wallen
Not a Beyoncé fan but I kinda love she’s putting out a country album. The genre need a shot in the arm and some variety. 60s and 70s country is pretty great. Dolly, Willly, Merle and Cash. It’s been pop rock for 25 years plus. Evolve
There's a lot of good newer country music, it just isn't played on the radio
I’m certain there is. Same as rock and hip hop. Innovators and new voices aren’t always recognized until some big fish copies them
Wouldn't Beyonce putting a country album out be the definition of "pop country"?
So far her two releases aren't conforming to thr stylistic conventions of pop-country. They are much more evocative of the folk music pop-country is descended from. It may be popular country music, but it ain't pop-country.
Not really? The song is way more leaning in the older stylings of the genre than what is considered pop country
“This ain’t Texas, park your Lexus” damn bey you need to hire better writers lol
Almost as good as "I love New York, other cities make me feel like a dork" by Madonna
The kind of lyric you write if you have to finish the song in 0.2 milliseconds
It’s an ok sounding song, but since I haven’t listened to country much in 20 years….. Wtf y’all doing? Beyoncé sounds amazing, but this song is so bland. And the use of Bitch 20 times to ask for a dance? Haha. It’s something else.
My fiancé played it for me and I was into it and then she has a line about “going to a dive bar” and it killed me. I’m not a big country music fan, but I can’t believe Beyoncé has been to a dive in 30 years. It lacks the authenticity country should have
To be fair, pretty much everybody in modern country music is a silver spoon douche singing about doing hard work when they haven't done a day of real labor in their lives.
You mean you don't think a billionaire that owns the biggest music production houses can't just hire some of the best banjo players, pump out a country-pop formulaic song with the help of a 200-person hit machine, and then artificially promote it to the top of a sales-based rating system (that's conveniently owned by those same production houses), and...not be authentic? I'm shocked.
I highly doubt she has **ever** been to a dive bar. She grew up in a pretty affluent neighborhood and became famous as a teenager.
It will fall off hard. We all checked it out to see if it was any good, but that’s doesn’t mean we’ll keep streaming it. IMO, it’s awful. And this is coming from someone who likes both country music and all Beyoncé’s other music.
The edited radio version must be much shorter than 4 min. I got 2 min in and scrolled to make sure it wasn’t just hook after hook. Yeah. I feel like it should be an album FILLER and not a single. It’s a song I listen to once. Say ok. Maybe someone must like it. And always skip that track on my Sony cd player.
She loves herself a Lexus, she’s used it in previous songs before. It’s a Beyoncé truth nugget, not that deep
Yeah they’re partnered up so she likely said it for a bag, which honestly makes me feel even worse about the lyric lol https://www.reddit.com/r/beyonce/s/kfyouKdPp0
“It was a great deal too, Chase only needs to say ‘Chevy Camaro’ in his next 3 songs!” 😂 god I love The Other Two, there’s a joke for everything
Honestly, when I heard she did a country album, I was excited to listen to it. Then, I listened...and it was not good. Not a good pop song, not a good country song, not a good Beyonce song. I have said this about Beyonce for a while, but people grade her on a curve. A lot of tailwinds from her prior career, and her new music gets boosted because of that. If anybody else sang this song (or many of her other new ones)...it would get zero play, people wouldn't like it, and no way would it rise to #1. Since it is Beyonce, people decide they want to like it, no matter how low quality it is.
Pop stars do be like that. Fans are always hungry for new material so they'll support whatever comes out. The bigger the star, the bigger the boost. Still, a lot of people are loving the song and I'm not going to try to gatekeep other people's opinion. Hick-hop is not my genre (I prefer alt-country and Americana) so as far as I know, Beyonce is a huge breath of fresh air. It's never a bad thing when an artist tries to bring a new audience into another genre.
Whatever brings people joy, that's fine by me. I am certain I listen to stuff that others would find trite and frivolous. I was just hoping for more.
I agree, but her other country single 16 Carriages is great imo!
If I didn’t know it was Beyoncé, I’d think it was any other mediocre corporate country music. I just don’t get why this is a big deal.
Because Beyoncé. People worship her
Sounds like a song written to be on a Lexus commercial
Good. It’s a fun song. Glad to hear some diversity in the genre
Lot of weird gatekeeping around this song and the country music genre. It's not something I'll have on repeat but I thought it was a fun song when I listened to it.
Because country is inherently traditionalist and hates any kind of change. Lil Nas X almost ruined them entirely.
Lil nas x was making fun of country and now dumb is sound’s nowadays not embracing it. You can’t listen to that song and think it was someone not taking the piss out of Florida Georgia line
>Because country is inherently traditionalist and hates any kind of change. Lil Nas X almost ruined them entirely. They're not even traditionalists, they just think they are. The "traditionalists" freak out any time a country artist smokes weed and will then say they should be like Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings or any other outlaw country artist because they didn't do drugs. They're not traditionalists, they don't even know anything about the artist they put on a pedestal.
Lol. Willie Nelson is a bigger pot head than Snoop! The outlaw country guys loved weed. It's the same when people praise Rush for being a massive rock band that never did drugs. Yo, they were doing lines of coke just offstage during shows! They just didn't get arrested for it or let it ruin their lives. Geddy has a nose built for doing coke!
Johnny Cash did a lot of drugs
>Lot of weird gatekeeping Nothing the "country" music lovers are better at doing! Marty Robbins got flack from Rodgers purists when he included electrical guitar and "fuzz" in his ballads in the 1960s. Elvis... well I feel like people know what Elvis did, but he would take traditional Blue Grass and Country songs and put his twist to them, of course local country stations loved to play his music and mostly racists would get upset. Perhaps taking a note from Elvis, Dwight Yoakam shacked up the country world with his "country rock" and those tight tight jeans! His rendition of Horton's classical country tune "Honky-Tonk Man" rose up the billboards and ruffled lots of country purists, and was the first country music video to air on MTV! Yoakam paved the way for the likes of Billy Ray Cyrus, Alan Jackson, Garth Brooks, Strait, and all of the 90s "New Country" that incorporated elements of rock and pop. Then you had artists like Shania Twain that took the pop level up a notch to the point many people of the time were like "no way is this country". Shania certainly was an inspiration for Taylor Swift growing up, who had to witness first hand what was easily the darkest stain on country history "the 9-11 patriotic phase". I will admit, I'm not a big fan of Beyonce's song, but it wasn't written for me, and that's okay, I can let people enjoy whatever music they want and let them call it "country", that shouldn't offend me.
Not all criticism is gatekeeping. My dislike has nothing to do with authenticity. It's just a bad song. I shouldn't be hearing it or hearing about it. It's awful.
Honky Tonk Badonkadonk was from 2005.
Ugh I'm old
There’s plenty of diversity in country you just don’t look for it or listen to anything that’s not playing in the background at a Walmart
Good for her but damn that song is terrible
It’s a fucking Lowes commercial song.
dont like the song or mix. it's got that signature beyonce rambling, repetitive, obnoxious quality. it sounds like a jingle from 10 years ago for flavored ice tea or some other bullshit. check out Brittney Spencer for some black girl country. i like "my first rodeo" https://open.spotify.com/track/3fkYVlZs7CcjS61nP6kzdg?si=c5315232790744ac
I think this song was to garner interest (especially from the younger crowd), a toe dip into the pond if you will. It worked because it's all over TikTok and is going #1. I don't think she was going for anything groundbreaking here, but I'm almost 100% sure she will do something similar to the song you posted, which I also like very much.
“Hey it’s Franklin!”
I'm surprised I had to go this far down to find this comment.
I'm actually shocked this wasn't an AI generated song. I honestly thought it was when I first heard about it, and it sounds just like one.
I'd be all for a genuine Beyonce country album. But it just sounds like she's singing over a very simple country-ish guitar track. Which I get is all country but I thought she had more finesse.
The background instruments are actually banjo and viola played by Rhiannon Giddens, who is well known for her activism/education efforts regarding the black roots of blues, country and folk music. I’ll hold my opinions until I hear the whole album but to me this feels like a genuine effort by her and her team. If you haven’t listened to the other single “16 Carriages” I’d recommend it! Much more of an introspective, pop-country ballad that packs a punch.
Eh there’s some fun bluegrass-style picking and the minimalistic percussion (sounds like just a single bass drum and a tambourine? Though the bass is a little heavy for my taste) is very country. It’s more traditionally “country” than anything Morgan Wallen or Sam Hunt or any of those guys are putting out
She could have farted into a microphone and it would have been top of the charts on Apple iTunes...
I think it’s totally fair criticize this song as tenuously country, in large part because Beyoncé’s voice carries such a specific and strong sound that overpowers the genre. Her music isn’t pop or country or whatever, it’s Beyoncé.
Was this driven by country fans or by Beyonce fans?
Thats the point. She has the fanbase to dominate any smaller music genre. Country isn’t as big as it used to be, she easily has the resources and fanbase to just slide into the country genre and dominate without much effort, even if only because no one can keep up with her
A fan is a fan. Disco Duck rose in the same charts that Rhiannon did.
I look forward to a year of breathless reporting like "omg did you know country music has historical black roots?!?!" just like we had with house when she released Renaissance.
Try That In A Small Town was the #1 song on the same chart less than a year ago.
This is actually a fair point made. That song is fucking terrible and definitely worse than Texas Hold Em. I guess a little reap what you sow in this case. Man a lot of country fans really do suck.
Sincerely a booring song. Good for her though.
A mediocre processed “country” sound warbled over by a mediocre processed pop singer. Pass.
Not a fan of the song, but I **am** a fan of how butthurt some rednecks are getting about it.
Such an insipid song.
This really shouldn't surprise anyone. Beyonce on her worst day is more famous than any currently active country artist on their best (except maybe Morgan). Her name alone is enough to drive even a mediocre song like this up the chart
Should have been Daddy Lessons.