’Superstars Blake Shelton and Luke Bryan will co-host country music’s party of the year, the 50th annual Academy of Country Music Awards, honoring country music’s best and introducing the industry’s hottest emerging talent.”
That line is the gist of a press release issued by CBS about the upcoming Academy of Country Music Awards.
It is the kind of marketing lingo that serious musicians point to when they say the industry has hijacked some of the most sacred institutions in country music as a way to make it prettier, flashier and jazzier and — above all — to bury its embarrassing hillbilly past so that young, well-heeled music lovers will attend the concerts and buy the music.
I have spoken with Mr. Shelton and Mr. Bryan and have found both to be thoughtful and interesting. They are nice, likable guys who have put out some great music.
That’s not the point. The point is that an awards show that at one time let fans choose their favorite country artists is now a way for the music industry to guide fans toward the performers they should favor.
Doubters need only take a look at the ever-growing number of categories, including the new artist of the year award first won by Dierks Bentley in 2003, and the AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, which serves as the venue for the performers.
We may all love Willie Nelson, Asleep at the Wheel’s Ray Benson, Loretta Lynn and Merle Haggard, but we don’t see them hosting this 50th anniversary show — even honorarily.
“You have to understand that this is a business, like making toilet paper,” one household-name second-generation country musician told me recently. “The people in the music industry don’t care about country music. They hate it. They can’t wait to clock out at 4:58 p.m. and go home and listen to bad rap from the ’90s.”
And, basically, go to work the next day and prod musicians to get that “bad rap from the ’90s” sound into their music. Why not? It sells.
I told another country musician — an up-and-coming female artist who is ready to break out — about this statement. “It’s true,” she said. “Everyone knows what the business is like. People in the industry tell me I have to lose weight, buy sexier clothes and, you know, well, update my sound.”
So why don’t the performers fight back?
“Everyone’s afraid,” she said. “It’s too powerful.”
As most fans know, country music was the antithesis of power when it was born in the 1920s in the South. It was based on storytelling and acoustic music, and it was anything but flashy. People gathered in barns, fields and makeshift halls to hear performers. Then they talked and jammed into the night.
Pay for a meet-and-greet? That would have seemed as improbable as paying for oxygen.
I recently read a commentary that noted Johnny Cash and Miss Lynn, among others, became American royalty by telling the stories of their hardscrabble lives through country music. But they were the types of royalty that not only welcomed their fans but also embraced them.
Now performer-based music is nothing new. Ever since Elvis Presley, the music industry has been performer-centric. Presley, The Beatles and other performers of that era proved that fans would shell out plenty of cash to attend concerts and buy the music of their idols.
That’s one reason the Academy of Country Music Awards — the first such show — started in 1966.
Of course, everyone profited. Record sales were brisk, concerts sold out and memorabilia was in high demand.
The problem is that the music industry itself has changed dramatically, even in the past decade. The reasons are myriad and too complex to discuss here, but the bottom line is, well, the bottom line. Sales of recorded music now take a back seat to live performances, so the music industry is vested in pulling in as many fans as possible to every live performance.
So far, so good, as evidenced by the sellout at the 80,000-seat AT&T Stadium.
And what do fans want to see?
Take a look at the press photos. Wind machines, light shows, electric guitars abound. Listen to the music of hosts Mr. Shelton and Mr. Bryan, and see if you don’t think their sound is a lot closer to traditional rock than traditional country.
Watch the show. Buy the music. Go to the concerts.
But ask yourself whether this is really country music.
The Academy of Country Music Awards will air at 8 p.m. EST Sunday on CBS.
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