It feels like all my relatives listen to this shit.
Growing up I had to listen to Toby Keith singing about putting a boot up Bin Laden’s ass so many times it’s permanently burned into my brain even though I lived north of the Mason-Dixon at the time.
something something white cultural identification something
edit: I mean this seriously, I just can’t remember what the exact terminology is for “participating in this [country music] culture as a way of reaffirming whiteness and the status quo that comes with it”
This is Sturgill Simpson erasure.
Sturgill Simpson just woke up one morning and decided to make like 5 new genres of music.
idk, why do people constantly have to post about how much they hate country music?
because it takes longer to say that I hate a certain predominant type of country music that is overwhelmingly the most likely to be heard in any public space or around almost anyone who “loves country” who isn’t a music head or a comrade. Like that’s a long ass sentence
Nickelback (or the contemporary equivalent) is terrible and ubiquitous, but you don’t see people saying “fuck, I hate rock music” without qualification.
There is no contemporary equivalent to Nickelback bc rock music isn’t really relevant that much anymore but I’ve heard people go out of their way to say they hate metal, jazz, hip hop, pop music, EDM, and disco without qualification plenty of times.
Not even saying I hate it, it’s pretty neutral to me, I just don’t get why it has such a hold on people not from the country or the south or rural areas.
Bc it sucks and there are entire parts of the country where it’s shoved down your throat.
Never been to Tennessee but I guess that’s all they play there. The radio stations are all country, talk shows, or gospel. No hip hop, rock, R&B, jazz…nothing. Person I knew was telling me about it, but maybe things have changed in the last 15ish years.
it’s pretty much everywhere… especially anywhere not near a city of a million+
I grew up in MO and where i lived we could get 4 different country stations and a pop station (that also played a bunch of country.) it wasn’t until my senior year of high school where you could get a rock station, which was actually cool bc they had a couple college kid DJs that played some cool stuff.
I wouldn’t have listened to any hip hop, R&B, jazz or punk without the internet. my family side eyes me if I happen to listen to any of those genres when I’m back home.
I went to suburban (read rich) Connecticut once, and ya that shit was everywhere.
pre 9-11 country music is actually goodGo ahead and add the Midwest to that too.
:(
You’re right though, so many people here think they’re rugged country men while listening to a pop music with fake southern accents by people that grew up in rich suburbs.
I always hated country music but got into it with Johnny Cashs American Recordings and after watching Ken Burns documentation “Country Music” I am even more open to it. It is a kind of grassroot music, music of the people.
also: shut up about your fuckin jeep
Coming from the (non-coastal) Southwest with midwestern parents, I fucking hate country music with every fiber of my being.
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It became one of the default “not of the city” music genres. It became the background noise of white people.
I was eating Korean food for lunch today at a new restaurant and the food was really good but they were playing that basic, country-esque White people music and it was terrible. I was like "Why, God?”
it’s conspicuous consumption as identity performance
THANK YOU. coming from a place where it is endemic and now living in the NE I was very confused about the love my rehab roomie had for it until she told me all about her extensive cop and conservative family and it clicked. Everyone else up here that listens to it that I personally have met is the same, and it’s never the kind of stuff I don’t mind hearing either (George jones or Gary Stewart or Delbert McClinton or even some patty loveless or juice newton). It’s always the trucks n flags n eagles shit, kinda reinforces the point
It’s not really conspicuous but yeah.
It can totally be conspicuous consumption. Have you ever tried to buy a new pair of cowboy boots? That shit is expensive. As is a lot of the other trappings of the genre/aesthetic like big trucks. Plus there’s an entire subset of people who spend a ridiculous amount of money to look like they’re dudes helping out on the family farm.
That’s not a country only thing but it definitely rubs people the wrong way.
Basically. White reactionaries in the middle class actually spend a good deal of money just so they can LOOK like poor people. Personally, I like to call them “cosplay cowboys”.
If you’re a poor fool like me who’s born in North America AND can’t afford to live in megacities like NYC, Montreal, Toronto, LA, etc. You know what I’m talking about.
Country music is not conspicuous. Which is the topic here.
I think the culture surrounding music is relevant when discussing it but even if we want to stick only to the actual music: steel guitars are super expensive and the lyrical themes of many country songs involve lifestyles most working class people are priced out of.
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It is when its being played in public
