Fans to the Left, Fans to the Right: Country Music Taste as Virtue Signaling
If I had a nickel for every time I’ve had this conversation, I’d be sitting on a big ass pile of nickels:
Person I’ve Just Met: So, what kind of music do you like?
Me: I like a lot of different kinds, but I mostly listen to country.
Person: I like country music. But, like, OLD country. You know, Johnny Cash, Dolly Parton, Merle Haggard - good country. I don’t like anything playing on the radio now. It’s SO awful.
Me: Well, I DO like a lot of the newer stuff. When I’m in my car, that’s almost all I listen to.
Person: Huh.
This exact conversation happens, almost without fail, EVERY time I tell someone that I love country music. And, to be perfectly honest, I’m getting really tired of it.
Modern country music has been low hanging fruit for a punchline for the past 20 years, if not more. There seems to be one thing a Left-leaning hipster and a MAGA cap-wearing papaw can agree on: “good” country stopped being made 30+ years ago. With very few exceptions, any music produced after 1990 is worthy of only the deepest scorn as a product of the slick, soulless, money making machine that the country music industry has become. In spite of his weird alter ego and the fact that he ushered in the era of “stadium country”, Garth Brooks is the last country artist that you’re allowed to enjoy without being judged a knuckle-dragging, jingoistic philistine from the Left and a brainwashed, valueless dumb ass from the Right.
Whatever. I’m not here to argue that mainstream country music isn’t a slick, soulless, money making machine. It absolutely is. I’m not here to argue the fact that there is an astonishingly large quantity of music being made specifically for knuckle-dragging, jingoistic philistines (and/or brainwashed valueless dumb asses for that matter). You bet your ass there is. No. The thing that I don’t always have the time or energy to explain in my exchanges with these virtue signalers is that there’s more to modern country music than Bo Burnham* or any YouTuber with a costume cowboy hat can pack into their scathing parodies. I’d like to leave these self-proclaimed musical connoisseurs with three thoughts:
Owning a record player isn’t a personality trait. Complaining about “newfangled instruments” and “departure from tradition” isn’t new - it’s been happening since the very beginning of the genre.
Country music doesn’t all sound the same. There is a LOT of great country music being made right now. Most of it isn’t being played on the radio, but some of it is! If you haven’t heard of folks like Kane Brown, Chris Stapleton, Kacey Musgraves, Mickey Guyton, Cody Jinks, Luke Combs, and Pricilla Block (I could go on), they’re all KILLING it at making fantastic mainstream country music.
Even some of that over-produced, poppy stuff is really fun to dance and sing along to. You don’t have to hate just it because it’s not “real country” (whatever that means). If you genuinely don’t enjoy it, fine. But if, as I suspect most people do, you dislike it on principle, think about it this way: has being a “purist” ever made a person more likable?
I’m done with “guilty” pleasures. I don’t have them because the things in which I take pleasure don’t make me feel guilt. They make me feel joy. I’m done with posturing to make sure others know I have “good” taste. What a complete waste of time. The people in my life who have scoffed at my taste in anything - cheese, movies, shoes, podcasts, and yes, music…I don’t hang out with them anymore because they weren’t fun to be around.
The key to freedom from folk who look down their noses at you, who demand “authenticity” for its own sake, who congratulate themselves on their superior affinities?
Practice this phrase, “Jump up your own ass you absolute killjoy.”
*I realize that Bo Burnham actually does have some good points in this. It’s quite a well done parody, tbh. But it’s the fact that I don’t buy the idea that he actually follows country music. He’s an outsider, a person who doesn’t actually care about the genre. I hate his take. It inspires the “I can talk shit about my family, but don’t you do it” brand of anger.
