The True Lesson of The Band Perry
This is not Groundhog Day. This is not a repeat episode. Do not adjust your monitors. And yes, that is The Band Perry.
The problem with money is you can always have more of it. You can always have more fans, more Facebook “likes,” a better car, a bigger house, a flatter stomach. You can always play bigger shows, and have more awards. 32 teams start the NFL season, and 31 of them finish it by losing. There’s always somebody better.
That is why it’s important that you don’t measure yourself as being the “best” by some arbitrary numeric sum that can always have more zeros behind it, or some industry-designated symbolic apex that will be handed to somebody else the very next year. Instead focus on being the best at being yourself that you can be. This is the only way you’ll ever find true fulfillment. For The Band Perry, it doesn’t seem to be interested in discovering what it truly is. Or even worse, it is purposely disregarding its true nature in pursuit of an goal that was never achievable for a little brother and sister string band from Mississippi in the first place.
You better be damn sure of your rationale when you veer so incredibly off the page believing there’s better opportunities out there. Because if you leave behind everything you were before, you’re going to leave behind all those people who followed you there, and they will turn their backs on you just like you did them.
Music is a young person’s game, and if you get even one hit single or album, you should count yourself incredibly, incredibly lucky, and already a member of an elite class. If you’re able to book a show and the people who show up are counted in the thousands instead of the dozens or hundreds, you’re already blessed beyond 99% percent of people who at some point choose to pursue music as a full-time career. If there’s catering backstage and big lavish buses for you and the crew, don’t question what else may lay out there for you if you could just reach everyone in the entire world, especially when that quest requires altering the life path that got you here.
So The Band Perry has reinvented itself for the third time in 18-months. I guess they think the third time is the charm, but it very well may be three strikes and you’re out. All of this has been driven by color-crazed image consultants, and any actual music has been almost like an afterthought. First it was Dollar General yellow, and the release of the doomed “Live Forever.” Then it was Maybelline tan, and the ironic “Comeback Kid.” Now it is jet black, and “Stay in the Dark.” None of these songs are especially terrible, they’re just terrible for The Band Perry. It’s not them.
People are not laughing at The Band Perry because it’s a pop band now. They’re laughing because it’s not a pop band, but it’s trying to be. And yes, how ironic that we were all called liars, including yours truly, for declaring the band was going in a pop direction, when here The Band Perry is officially decreeing it now. It will not work. Because it doesn’t matter how determined you are, or how much hard work you put in when your nose is pointed in the wrong direction. Your perseverance will only make things worse. The Band Perry is a perfect example of this.
The people criticizing The Band Perry 18 months ago for going pop were not just being mean to them, and they certainly weren’t liars. They were choosing to do something The Band Perry is clearly unwilling or unable to do for itself: they were being honest. These criticisms weren’t cruel; they were a sign of respect. But The Band Perry has chosen to “Stay in the Dark.”
I’m not laughing at The Band Perry, I feel sorry for them. Because they were bestowed opportunities most musicians and people in other professions can only dream of. And it wasn’t enough for them. There had to be more. And very likely they will lose it all because of it.
Yet for the life of them, they just can’t give up the damn fight.
Angelo Rinaldi
February 3, 2017 @ 10:40 am
They are nuts, this will definitely crush their career. They never had a big fandom, but the only fans they ever had were tethered to the country (pop-country) realm, now they will alienate them and lose it all. Even ZBB came back with a more country song after the relative flop of Jekyll + Hide: at least they still managed to have #1 hits, the poor Band Perry is only collecting flops since 2015. What are they thinking? It’s clear this new pop direction will lead them nowhere, they surely know it (the flops proved it). I can’t wrap my mind around it.
Not even Shania Twain in her heyday dared to do this, only Taylor Swift pulled it off (but she did it step by step with a big fandom behind her). Hell, I could see Carrie Underwood or Blake Shelton try a similar move since they are superstars, but The Band Perry?
This will be fun to watch. Maybe they’ll come crawling back to country music, maybe they’ll disappear.
I really hope for them to be successful though, their pop music is not so bad.
Trigger
February 3, 2017 @ 11:14 am
They already did come crawling back to country with “The Comeback Kid” and it failed, partly because they declared country media liars for saying they went pop. The Band Perry has no dry powder left, and nowhere to go. Either this new song becomes a Top 5 on the Billboard Hot 100, which is incredibly difficult these days, or they fail. This is the expectation they have built for themselves.
Angelo Rinaldi
February 4, 2017 @ 5:56 am
Both Live Forever and Comeback Kid were promoted at country radio though, so they were still in the country-pop realm. Now they are going full pop without the help of their previous format.
Adrian
February 4, 2017 @ 3:37 pm
What has happened to The Band Perry is very unsurprising. I’ve always thought of them as a band of also rans with a weak artistic identity, along with the likes of Lady Antebellum, Sugarland, Shedaisy, Lonestar, and Rascal Flatts. They were a generic band that sold generic music. Mainstream country tends to attract those kinds of acts, largely due to the genre’s reliance (at least in the pre bro country days) on cautious suburban soccer moms and mainstream white girls who just want to fit in. Many mainstream artists and bands are basically just hired guns, who follow the latest fads and who want to get commercial success the easy way.
I first heard of The Band Perry when they released “If I Die Young”, which sounded vaguely like a Taylor Swift song without the personality of Taylor Swift, and which was apparently aimed at attracting a similar demographic. What they might have missed was that Taylor’s commercial success had less to do with her music, than with selling group identity politics and creating what basically amounted to a huge for profit sorority for insecure teens. None of the members of The Band Perry ever became a cult figure or attracted a large following of fans who strongly and emotionally identified with them. If you were to ask young people who don’t listen to country radio what they think of them, they would probably say “the band who?”. Kimberly and her folks are just another cog in the Nashville machine.
Angelo Rinaldi
February 5, 2017 @ 7:48 am
The very fact they are irrelevant makes their transition to pop very unusual. They don’t have the fanbase nor the pop radio support to pull it off. Had they stayed true to their original sound (which was more country than 80% of other mainstream acts) they could’ve enjoyed success for over a decade (like Rascal Flatts).
Maybe they weren’t very good to begin with, but I kinda liked their music as far as mainstream country is concerned. Postcard From Paris in particular is my favorite. I don’t reckon it’s fair to put them on the same level as Lady A and RF, they were a lot better.
I’m sure nobody in the Nashville machine wanted them to chase pop stardom since the failure is 99% inevitable, it’s all about their own silly decision.
Adrian
February 5, 2017 @ 4:47 pm
I think there are two common motivations for country artists to try to cross over to pop. One motivation is ambitious (e.g. “We’ve had a lot of commercial success in country, now we want to go to the big leagues and we’ll double the sales of our next album”). The other motivation is defensive (e.g. “Country is a backwater, people think we’re hayseeds so they don’t take us seriously. We need to change our tune to be respectable”). The second motivation is absolutely the worst reason for a country artist to cross over.
In the case of The Band Perry I’m guessing that it is more of the first reason. They were a big fish in a small pond for a while, they had a few hits and thought they can take the next step and attract a bigger mainstream audience. Also I think they were trying to appeal to a young audience, and young listeners’ tastes have become more urban and progressive in recent years. Probably after Taylor left the genre many young girls have left the pop country genre (except for those who are bro country fans).
Michael T.
February 3, 2017 @ 10:59 am
So sad. Pioneer was such a great mainstream country album in my opinion. These newly released photos are a serious cry of “Identity crisis”
seak05
February 3, 2017 @ 11:07 am
I don’t think the Band Perry will find success as a pop band. But if they want to make pop music, then they should be able to choose to make pop music. At least (like Taylor) they are calling a spade a spade, and going to pop radio. Unlike say Sam Hunt and the latest Keith/Carrie match-up, which aren’t country at all, but are still selling themselves to country radio.
As someone who likes listening to a variety of music, I can understand musicians who want to work across different genres, be it Taylor, Sturgill, ZBB, or the Band Perry. In fact, when artists don’t push themselves, and instead only release stuff that they already know their fans will like, they tend to get stale. Now of course, some do it better than others, but as long as they’re honest, I don’t begrudge them the attempt.
Trigger
February 3, 2017 @ 11:12 am
This is not about a country artist choosing to go pop because they want to fulfill that portion of themselves in music. We are so far beyond that. The Band Perry went pop, failed, came back to “country” with “The Comeback Kid,” declared everybody liars for saying they ever went pop, failed again, and are now declaring once again they’re going pop because their country comeback failed. At this point you need a diagram to keep up.
Adam
February 3, 2017 @ 3:43 pm
A very nice self congratulatory post but completely irrelevant to the intent of the article. Par for the course from you though.
seak05
February 4, 2017 @ 12:30 pm
*I don’t understand what post was about/don’t agree with it, ooh I’ll just name call, that’ll make me feel cool*
To dumb it down: getting angry about a musician being confused about their identity, or a musician switching identity, is dumb. Even when the artists get angry & defensive about it (and they nearly always do, see the much loved on this blog, Sturgill). Be glad they’re calling themselves pop, and not shipping this crap to country radio (hopefully) and move on.
Hiram Bodden
February 3, 2017 @ 11:19 am
It would have been so much better if this band had died young….
marc
February 3, 2017 @ 11:33 am
Thought I was walking into a Black Eyed Peas review.
Kevin Wortman
February 3, 2017 @ 11:37 am
Trigger, as a point of order, not all NFL teams (other than the Super Bowl Champion) finish with a loss. As far as the Band Perry…I have high hopes that zometime down the road, they can take these mis-steps and poor decisions and parlay them into some real deal country lyrics.
Kevin Wortman
February 3, 2017 @ 11:38 am
…and that chick has abs, so what’s the problem?
Trigger
February 3, 2017 @ 1:30 pm
These are your rebuttals?
Kevin Wortman
February 3, 2017 @ 1:48 pm
No…a rebuttal would imply an argument.
OMFS88
February 3, 2017 @ 2:39 pm
Actually a pretty distinct lack of definition for somebody that slim
BwareDWare94
February 3, 2017 @ 11:38 am
I did not think the 2 brothers could look more like dbags, but they’ve proven me wrong.
Michigan Music
February 3, 2017 @ 11:47 am
Seriously Band Perry? SERIOUSLY!?
I actually laughed at the photos of the band here. Amazingly bad. I sorta thought it was a joke or Trigger just put up something really unflattering to mock them. Nope, this is EXACTLY what Band Perry was going for! Kimberely said – “Hey I don’t really want to be taken seriously any more so let’s just shoot for lowest common denominator, put me in a biking and pull the waist line down as far as possible. I can be any generic tart out there showing skin and getting eyeballs to pause for a moment”. The brothers, who knows why they agreed to their new looks.
None of what they are doing for the past 2 years feels organic or natural. The color coding theme changes, the fashion looks, all of it is so terribly thought out, planned and executed. Frankly, they could be ANY band with this amount of marketing polish and shine – who actually cares what the band is like and if they are at all talented? Put it in the marketing machine, crank the lever a bit, and spit out a generic hoped for it.
Remember, they had an entire album ready for Live Forever. Video clips emerged online of them playing them, complete with AWFUL choregraphy that couldn’t have looked more unnatural. Put Me in The Game Coach was one of the classic terrible songs that existed for a while by Band Perry but seems to have disappeared into the ether with the yellow color coding.
The Band Perry…if you don’t like us right now, just wait as we are changing looks/sounds soon anyhow!
Michigan Music
February 3, 2017 @ 11:53 am
Post Script…
August 1, 2016:
“Folks were freaking out for a half-minute, like ‘Interscope, is that a pop label?!”
As for the storyline that the Band Perry were “going pop”? “We never said it,” Kimberly insists.
http://tasteofcountry.com/the-band-perry-not-going-pop/
February 3, 2017:
The Band Perry have announced a brand-new single, “Stay in the Dark,” and revealed plans for a forthcoming new album — “our very first pop album,” the band says — called My Bad Imagination.
http://theboot.com/the-band-perry-stay-in-the-dark-new-album-2017/
Lucas
February 3, 2017 @ 12:08 pm
“I guess they think the third time is the charm, but it very well may be three strikes and you’re out.” – Someone give Trigger a medal for this one!
The Ghost of Buckshot Jones
February 3, 2017 @ 12:47 pm
Friendly reminder that Kimberly Perry is 34 years old. Seems like a prime time to go jump into the tween-pop market, again.
Lunchbox
February 3, 2017 @ 4:36 pm
smokin hot 34
Adrian
February 3, 2017 @ 11:28 pm
That’s about the same age as Shania Twain when she released Come On Over, and younger than when Shania released “Up!”. Singers are able to act much younger than their age when they think they see dollar signs. But the young ones don’t always go for it. Usually the tweens prefer female idols who are themselves in their teens or 20s, Shania was popular with teen girls back in the day but that was an exception that proves the rule.
Dave
February 7, 2017 @ 11:17 am
Yes, I think Shania was more a mentor/idol type for young girls. Particularly as – attractive as she was – Shania did look like she was in her mid-30s.
Corncaster
February 3, 2017 @ 1:01 pm
They look exactly like rich kids slumming in Paris.
albert
February 3, 2017 @ 1:56 pm
Remember the good old days when a good , honest song lyric was all you needed to express yourself as a musical artist ? I guess today if you have nothing left to say ( and that’s pretty much everyone playing the commercial country game….) you have no other choice but the big sellout ….masquerade as someone who MAY be PERCEIVED as hip and successful by the mindless and finicky consumers you are hoping to deceive.
Bring in a choreographer , bury the mandolin , bring in another guitar or two , build some abs , buy a look ( preferably a decidedly ‘tough’ look cuz that NEVER goes outa style with the 13 year olds…BTW ..which one of these three is Billy Idol again ..? ) and make sure to let everyone know you’ve decided NOT to ‘ Stay In The Dark ‘ by recording a song called ‘Stay In The Dark ‘ . Newsflash ….this band has never been MORE in the dark as they stumble around hoping to bump into a marketable image without going the route of simply recording a GOOD song . Like in the good old days .
Jeff
February 3, 2017 @ 2:14 pm
Kimberly Perry’s husband JP Arencibia MLB career went in the toilet the day they got married.
CountryKnight
February 3, 2017 @ 6:36 pm
Like Lefty Gomez, he lost his fastball in the sheets.
RWP
February 3, 2017 @ 2:16 pm
LOL Looks like she’s going for a Lzzy Hale look here.Friggn hilarious. And the two brothers,wow,I have no idea. THEY don’t even know who they are anymore
Razor X
February 3, 2017 @ 2:34 pm
Truly cringe-worthy. Obviously they will say and do anything to try and break into the pop market but who is advising them and why hasn’t someone told them they are making fools of themselves?
Sam Cody
February 3, 2017 @ 2:59 pm
Isn’t that a picture of Queensryche, circa 1985?
Marky Mark
February 3, 2017 @ 7:57 pm
Wow, why you wanna insult queensryche like that. Queensryche had skills.
the pistolero
February 4, 2017 @ 3:55 pm
I was about to say, Geoff Tate was a much better singer than Kimberly Perry even on Kimberly’s best day.
Pete M
February 3, 2017 @ 4:34 pm
The Band Perry will flop as a pop group. Country will not take them back but they had 5 years on top of country music. They will not successful like Taylor Swift on pop world. very sad indeed they were a good band.
John
February 3, 2017 @ 5:09 pm
This is my first time positing here. I just had to say something when I read about them making a full pop album. As a huge fan of pop music I just don’t see them being able to pull it off. I could be wrong but I doubt it. I don’t know if they think that since Tay did it, they can also. In any event, this new song of theirs just isn’t doing it for me.
Domingos Silva
February 3, 2017 @ 6:43 pm
I WAS a big fan ,they know me by name so i wrote them one more time,because this time with this image they really gone crazy.I am a Portuguese who lives in Portugal who has brothers in the music industry,i am also a musician but it is not my job,i wrote the folllowing:
You guys (The Band Perry) don’t learn,i told you so many times that this and the other songs that you experimented live were not good enough,even in pop,and to me this kind of plastic production doesn’t stick,you close everything sonically,look at the snare,the guitars have no power,even the voices,,in fact that is the problem ,one of the problems,lack of clarity,lack of a clear path,lack of good management…it is so insane because after winning a grammy you wanted more when you were at the top,pop fans would follow,but then ambition and vanity took over ,you started to run after others and betrayed your roots and your image,sorry to say but this is the same story of Live Forever and comeback kid,only that now with your new image and the fans that you lost and know how you operate it will be harder to recover,but you had to go your way,if you the band members are happy,good for you,but this will not bring you back to your former glory.
I alkready told you what you need to do to get back to sucess,you have to create new songs,we have to write good poems again,the songs have to be more melodicaly consistent and rich with longer sentences,you have to go back to your roots,the songs must be able to be played by the three of you only,everything must be clear…if we look at your former comeback kid it started pure but when it reached the bristol show,it was already faster for the people to clap,verses were cut,the white clothes were forgotten replaced by some fashion trend,even Kimberly’s hair must go back to blond,this is the second start over…will we have a third,you still have time to achieve the sucess you want,this way you won’t do it.
For the fans that read this let me tell you that some of the fanatic THE BAND PERRY fans call me a hater,Kimberly wrote me bye,bye…i was a hater,if you read this comment it is a fierce critic but full of ideas for them to get back to sucess,look at their shows now and in the past…back then soul and light,not dark,soul and light has to come and i am telling the band what it needs to do ,because they have a lot of talent and beauty but they are lost in their path,go back to your roots and simplicity and find your soul,or it won’t stick even in pop,sorry,this is the truth,but it is my truth…if your happy,good for you.This comment is going to be saved.If you continue on this path you will destroy your carreer,although i have to say that your first five years on the spotlight and music are amazing and i thank you for that.
Sam Cody
February 4, 2017 @ 8:06 am
After this look fails them, I think they should try dressing up like a cop, biker, and construction worker…
Nona
February 4, 2017 @ 9:55 am
Trigger, I love the site and just wanted to say I always get excited to see your take on TBP’s strange career choices. It’s dumbfounding and frustrating to watch them flail, but fascinating to read your play-by-play analysis. Please keep it up!
Trigger
February 4, 2017 @ 10:39 am
Thanks Nona.
Will
February 4, 2017 @ 1:47 pm
Trig, any chance you’re gonna check out Lauren Alaina’s new record? I feel like she gets pop-country balance just right on it, whereas TBP miss every time. There are a few duds, for sure, but on the whole I’m a big fan of like 65% of it. Just wondering!
Trigger
February 4, 2017 @ 2:11 pm
It’s on the radar.
Adrian
February 4, 2017 @ 7:08 pm
In recent months my local country station has been playing a new single by Lauren. Surprisingly it wasn’t awful, though I didn’t like her when she was on American Idol and still don’t care for the pop country sound. She was on the show the year Scotty won. If you had told me back then that Lauren would still be around six years later and Scotty would be dropped by his label, it would have been hard to believe. But in retrospect her subgenre is more marketable than his. I would guess that there isn’t a big youth market for the more traditional sound that Scotty preferred, or for an artist with such a conservative persona.
Songbird85
February 6, 2017 @ 3:12 pm
Sorry Trigger but isn’t your article a little contradictory? You say that you should be true to who you are as an artist/band but then you go and slam TBP and say they aren’t pop and that’s not who they are. But it’s not up to you to decide what type of band they are, or who they are. It’s their band and if they believe that they are a pop band and that’s what their dream has been all along then it’s not for you, me or anyone else to judge them on that decision. I loved their first album and for me that’s where it ended. After that it wasn’t really the same and they weren’t able to follow up on that success. But that’s a story that’s been told so many times before. But I don’t have anything against them wanting to try a different style of music. It’s their lives, they can do what they like. They shouldn’t have to cow toe to people who are of no consequence to them just because those people want them to make music like their first album. Its times like this that my utter dislike of putting stuff into a genre becomes more prevalent. Why does genre exist, so we can stuff music into a nice little box and say that’s what it should be like, sound like and when it doesn’t we tear our hair out because heaven forbid people should experiment with music. I am not opposed to people taking what you call country music and experimenting with the sound and adding other elements in – this is how music evolves. Music should never be limited, that’s not art, that’s not true expression. That’s just called being boring and keeping other people happy because that’s the way they want it. Stuff that, if a musical artist just spent their life keeping other people happy and weren’t doing what was true to them then no matter how much success you have you’ve failed – you’ve spent all that time living a lie and never being true to yourself or the music. I encourage musical artists to buck tradition and experiment with new sound, but most importantly to be honest in their sound and find their voice and not to let those whose ideas and opinions serve no other purpose than to keep them achieving these goals stop them. Music is not limited, nor should it ever be. Anyone who wants to limit music and artistic impression through music has no understanding of what music really is. Does this mean that you have to like the music no, and you can say you don’t like it. But just because you don’t like it doesn’t mean it’s wrong. There is no wrong in music.
Domingos Silva
February 6, 2017 @ 10:59 pm
Songbird85,let me tell that there there is wrong in music as there is wrong in life,and the wrong starts when music starts to loose importance in a band’s carreer and going to gym,showing new shoes and starting copying others becomes more important,the Band Perry thinks this way…oh,that guy is a producer that worked for Gaga,let’s work with him…that photographer is famous ,let us hire him…and so on… these siblings hav real talent but some how they lost their soul,people can sense that,the glow of the band perry is not there anymore,that is so strange,there is a emptyness now.There is a wrong in music as in anyother profession or job,the wrong is that their work is not being good,is loosing quality,there is wrong in music when it is not so beautiful anymore.There is wrong when you destroy your carreer survive two warning shots and try to attack the same way,they do not listen to criticism…even from the visual point of view they are not collecting the benifits of beauty,in special Kimberly,they are destroying thjeir image,if you go to Kim’s Instagram and watch wo she follows you will see the Kardashians ,Kanye and such,that has repercussions and they don’t learn…i have never seen this in a band…it is sad and strange.
Songbird85
February 7, 2017 @ 5:52 pm
A quote from the band themselves:
“If there’s one thing we’ve learned in making it it’s this–being yourself matters. It matters even when not everyone agrees that you should be or understands why it’s important that you are.”
It’s not wrong for them to be who they are, you think it’s wrong because you don’t agree. It’s their band, it’s their choice. If you don’t like the music simple, don’t listen.
Domingos Silva
February 9, 2017 @ 11:01 am
Hello Songbird85,are you from the Band Perry,because you seem to be trying to supress criticism.Watch the comments from the people who watch their performance at the Jimmy Fallon show and the likes on it.
They have the right to be who they say they are and have the right to express what i think it,in ther facebook i cannot because they do not allow me,but as far as know this a free forum and there is more:To band Perry the real fans are a small and smaller number who always praises them,WRONG…if you saw a loved one in a path destruction wouldn’t you try to save them?,But IN FACT if they to kill the band they will….
Songbird85
February 9, 2017 @ 7:30 pm
I don’t know TBP at all, I’m just not going to be negative about them deciding to change there musical direction because frankly it’s none of my business what they do with their band. Like TS going pop, if that’s what she wants to do then that’s her choice. Poor BP they put out country music none of you liked and branded pop – you criticized them to the brink of pushing Kimberley over the edge (the poor girl) and then they do the right thing an announce they are going pop and you throw your toys out of the cot all over again. They can’t seem to win, perhaps it’s best they do fail and cease to exist then at least they would have lived up to your expectations of them. Heaven forbid that anyone in country music should have the balls to try something else – nope just stay doing the exact same thing your entire carer so everyone whose not you is happy. Path of destruction?? Dude, they aren’t dealing drugs or killing people. They just want to try their hand at something else. Why shouldn’t they? Why should they stay stuck in a box the obviously aren’t happy in? That’s not fair. I worked in the same place for years and after a few years it became boring and predictable and I needed to leave. I needed to know I could do something else. It’s no different for artists. Look we could go around and around and neither of us are going to change our minds or agree with the other. So lets just end it here with you feeling the way you do and me feeling the way I feel.
I really wish them all the best with their new path and hope they find whatever it is they are looking for. Good on them for being brave enough to do it.
Amy
February 6, 2017 @ 9:08 pm
Hey Trigger, you should review Carrie and Keith’s “The Fighter”. One of the lines is “He didn’t deserve you
cause you’re precious heart is a precious heart” Clearly, a masterpiece.
I think is one of the worst songs of the decade, what do you think?
JohnWayneTwitty
February 6, 2017 @ 11:14 pm
How does that one “fella” play an instrument without a hand?
Josh
April 6, 2017 @ 7:40 am
I like the Band Berry, but I agree they don’t sound very good in Pop. I honestly think Pop is a lot harder for Country artists to make, which is why most of them tend to sound sub-par when they make Pop or Pop-Country songs. However, I believe it is up to The Band Perry to figure out what kind of band they are, even if it upsets us on this country music blog.
Animated Dust
September 17, 2018 @ 6:05 pm
September 17, 2018 —– They’re b-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-c-k!!!!!!!