JPF Home Page Forums General Messages General Message Forum Why today's country BLOWS!!!!

Michael,

LOL..It's funny to me, and a bit frustrating that you say you can't see how this became an old vs new debate, then tell me "pay attention," and then say "today's country music blows, today's country has no heart, etc."



But your point is that these are just not "good, honest songs, with real emotion?" So is it a case of mutual exclusivity? If a song is well produced and sung well it simply cannot be a good honest song?

In your opinion, music produced through the Nashville system is "mostly crap" and you are entitled to your opinion. But at the same time, you are also saying loud and clear that people who like it cannot possibly be liking it for it's own merits, but because they have been manipulated by a system (your words) that is no different than Hollywood's.

So let me see if I've got this, Michael, because I am listening and trying to understand. You are saying that all people who like any of the music that comes out of today's Nashville have been manipulated into liking this music? That is rather a tall statement, don't you think? Perhaps you might go into a little detail and tell me how exactly Nashville is manipulating me and Kostad and every person that likes any Nashville music? It sounds like some kind of mind control, LOL.

Certainly there's a certain amount of homogenization that occurs in Nashville. It is a system aiming at big numbers, but that doesn't mean that what comes out is soulless. Good, honest songs still come out, because there are good, honest people in Nashville that are part of the process of writing, performing and producing them. Your generalized and paranoid rant poo poohs away a lot of good stuff in one fell swoop, and that's too bad.

Perhaps instead of seeing it as being a case of youthful gullibility, manipulation and possibly mind-control, perhaps give folks who like music that you don't, such as (modern) Nashville made music, a tiny little bit of credit, That maybe we like what we do because we find something in it to like? And if you then want to think of us as being lesser beings for that, that we are being controlled or whatever..that's fine. But do realize, it kinda makes you sound like a jerk, you know? You, presuming to know why everybody buys this soulless, pretentious Nashville crap, as you call it.

And just because I defend Nashville doesn't mean I don't buy Texas artists like Guy Clark and Butch Hancock and Jimmie Dale Gilmore and countless others.. Perhaps I see Nashville to be "apples" and music that's not made through the Nashville system as "oranges" instead of a blanket good/bad situation?

I have a hard time with folks who want to tell me what art is good and what is bad. What to like and not to like. The nature of art is that we get to decide that for ourselves, and that aesthetic thought about what is good and what is bad is for the most part subjective, no matter how hard one beats ones chest..

If you come away from this conversation, Michael, thinking that I must not like good, honest songs, then you have entirely missed my point.

Mike