"Country" radio is horrible

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who you got?

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How much time do you have cause I can list great modern country artists all night.

Jason Boland
Turnpike Troubadours
American Aquarium
Sturgill Simpson
John Moreland
Jason Isbell
Hayes Carll
Ray Wylie Hubbard
Shovels and Rope
And many more

Classic Waylon. Hell, the Louvin Brothers wouldn't even be able to pay the rent these days.

It's been dead. I wish I could kill new country with fire.

Mainstream is what I meant. Not a country fan, so my opinion is worthless.

Took a road trip today and the driver put it on a new country station, and I really express my hatred for it here all the time, but when you listen to it, it just makes your blood boil and your jaw immediately start to grind your teeth...I'd rather be deaf for life

Tom Petty: "What they call country music today is sort of like bad rock groups with a fiddle."

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Nashville country right now is kind of like hair metal was in the 80's.

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Wife drug me to Tim McGraw the other day. Observations

1. Tim has been in Vegas too long. He walked down the aisle. Like a fighter. Bag pipe music playing.

2. Opening act kept making the Dio "devil horns" symbol. He would then do it with both hands across his chest like he invented it and not some dude 30 years ago.

3. Opening act drummer had a Mohawk.

4. Mcgraws lead guitarist had a Foo Fighters shirt on.

5. McGraws keyboard player was euro and wore tight red euro jeans. And his drummer was Turkish.

6. McGraw wore a reebok workout t-shirt for the whole show.

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Opening act drummer had a Mohawk.

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I'm curious was Brantley Gilbert the opening act? He played the side stage on the Willie Nelson tour a couple of years ago, and that was the least country looking country band I think I have ever seen.

I think I would've had to have shoved the nearest sharp object into my ear if forced to sit through a whole Brantley Gilbert/Tim McGraw show

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"Country" radio is horrible

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The Wife has been a pop music fan her whole life (Michael Jackson, the Bee Gees, etc.) She has always hated country music (Johnny Cash, Willie, Waylon or REK).

Until the last few years. Now she's a huge country music fan: Tim McGraw, Sugarland, Luke Bryan, Darius Rucker, Lady Antebellum.

So, to simply reiterate the point made on this Board ad nauseum, traditional airwave radio stations calling themselves 'country' are playing pop music i.e. "Nashville Pop."

Country music has grown so large it can now be delineated into at least two genres: Nashville Pop and Texas-Red Dirt- Alternative Country. It would be easy to refer to the latter as "real country," but pop fans find this condescending.

So my world is divided into the shows I attend (Chris Knight recently, BJ Barham coming up, TT, AA, Roger Creager, REK Jr.) and the shows I attend with The Wife: Darius Rucker, looking for tix to Jack Johnson, Luke Bryan,Dianna Ross and Kenny Chesney w/ Zac Brown all coming up). I've learned its in my best interest to enjoy each of these for who they are and what they do.

The question always lurking around the corner: What makes a song or an artist 'country?' Is it the lyrics? Is it the instruments (steel guitar, fiddle?) Is it the clothes they wear? Is it the radio station that decides to play their music?

And can an artist crossover? Be Nashville Pop on some songs, 'real country' on others? I'm going to see Chris Young this evening. And I'll throw Corey Smith in this mix.

And since we have a 'Texas Country', is there now a "Carolina Country" ... sort of Atlanta through South Carolina upto North Carolina?

And why did CottonWasKing leave Jason Aldean off of his list of real country artists?

These are the questions that keep me awake at night.