for years, Broadway was one of the very few personalities in mainstream country radio willing to ask tough questions of artists, willing to broach subjects otherwise thought of as taboo in the mainstream, and overall just show guts and independent thinking in an otherwise stuffy, closed-off world. And he did it all with class and respect.
Garth Brooks, take your free tickets to the Auditorium Shores stage and your Frito bags with your damn brand on them, and go back to Oklahoma and roll around naked in your massive, massive piles of money. You don’t belong at South By Southwest.
An all-star cast will come together to celebrate the life and music of country music icon and Hall of Famer Don Williams in a new tribute album with the proceeds going to a good cause. ‘Gentle Giants: The Songs of Don Williams’ will be released on May 26th via Slate Creek Records.
Deep breaths everybody, deep breaths. You can put your pitchforks away. Yes, The Randy Rogers Band will be playing in Washington D.C. for a function that runs parallel with the Presidential inauguration in February, but it is a long-running event that’s been held since 1953 by the Texas State Society.
If Garth’s comeback is going to be broad based and lasting, he’s got to impact beyond being a vessel for nostalgia. He needs a “Kokomo,” or at least something that impacts radio even slightly so he’s not just re-singing “Friends In Low Places” forever. And that’s what you get with “Baby, Let’s Lay Down and Dance.”
Jerry Reed and Ricky Skaggs may still be on the outside looking in when it comes to the Country Music Hall of Fame, but the Musicians Hall of Fame in Nashville, located on the other side of downtown in the Municipal Auditorium, has decided these two country music superpickers are worthy of induction. And along […]
The hip thing in 2016 for many big-named artists is to only make their music available on one specific streaming or download service, usually in a deal struck between the artist’s label or management and the streaming service in hopes of drawing more subscribers towards one service, or in many cases, away from another—specifically Spotify.
The best-selling country artist of all time and the last major holdout in all of music to make his songs and albums available for streaming may be finally acquiescing to reality. According to a report, Garth has reached a deal with Apple for $30 million, and his turning over his catalog to the company to service his music.
The reason so many can make so much money on the secondary market is because there is way more demand than there is supply. And by performers not ramping up their supply and only playing one, or maybe two shows in a market that could potentially support four or five, they’re allowing the secondary market to thrive.
The implosion of the rock genre, especially on radio, has made country a haven for rock stars looking to keep their careers relevant, ultimately spreading the cancer of declining careers to the country format as well. If Steven Tyler’s move to country had anything to do with inspiration or influence, you won’t hear much of it on this new record.
You know, I would normally be so diametrically opposed to any rapper announcing his intent to make a country record that I would puff my chest out in defiance, shake my little fists, and give other indications of a stony countenance to let them know that I’ll be damned if they waltz through the gates of country music without at least a strong dose of hostile friction from my disgruntled ass.
This isn’t just a problem for big mainstream bands playing massive venues anymore. As independent music continues to take over market share, and there continues to be a slow build of interest in more substantive music, this issue is starting to affect performers that a few years ago fans were used to seeing in dingy bars with 20 other people.
How people listen to music is clearly changing, but much of the country music industry isn’t following suit. In a town that employs scores of people just to push songs to radio, Nashville doesn’t know how to behave any differently than they did 60 years ago. Entire companies are based around trying to sell songs to country radio. The difference now is radio is no longer the only game in town.
Love them, hate them, evoke the strong opinions of the Coen Brothers’ fictional character Jeff “The Dude” Lebowski all you want, but Glen Frey and The Eagles turned millions of music fans from all around the world into country music listeners through the evocative power of simple, universal sentiments bathed in twangy tones, however filed off the edges may have been, or however commercially successful the pursuit ultimately was.
It was a busy year in country music, with lots of controversy, lots of legal issues, and even death surrounding country music artists. It was a tumultuous 2015 to say the least. Here are the top news stories of the year taking into consideration 1) Their importance to country music overall 2) The interest, or accumulated interest in the story if covered in multiple articles, based on traffic registered at Saving Country Music.
One of the big story lines in country music over the past few years has been the rehabilitation of country music from a quarter century ago that emerged during the period known colloquially as the “Class of ’89.” Despite the commercial rise of country during the era, it’s also the period people love to point […]
The idea of retiring from playing music seems like such a foreign notion on the surface. We like to think that artists make music because they have to—because it’s all they know and it’s in their blood. Some just happen to make money and get famous from it along the way. Quitting music would be like deciding to quit watching sunsets or eating ice cream with your family or something.
So what’s to learn from hitching a ride in Marty McFly’s time machine and traveling back to 1985? That the problems country music is facing today are virtually the same ones that were being faced 30 years ago. It’s all cyclical, as canonized in the old Gospel tune enshrined in the architecture of the Country Music Hall of Fame asking the question, “Will The Circle Be Unbroken?”
All of the music Garth has been working on for a new release over the last six months? It’s currently sitting on a phone that’s dead, and nobody can get it to power back up at the moment. That’s right, there’s no backup, no Plan ‘B’, it’s all just gone unless they figure out somehow to salvage the files. Six full months of studio time and effort could be completely flushed down the drain.
It’s fitting that Clint’s last name is “Black” because he seems to have spent his entire career overshadowed by his peers, even when he was at his commercial peak. As part of the now famous “Class of ’89,” he was always vying for attention with Garth Brooks, Alan Jackson, and Brooks & Dunn. He still was wildly successful. 22 #1 singles is nothing to scoff at.
