While I was stuck in the dark without electricity, I was listening to local radio, for weather reports. I came to this conclusion: I don’t care for much of what passes for country music these days.
I’m not even certain it IS country music anymore… country pop is a better classification I believe.
In that case, I suggest you have a battery operated cd player (or ipod) and some Hank Williams cds on hand for the next power outage.
Agreed: since I’ve started developing a taste for Country, I’ve found that I like the “classics” much better than a lot of the new stuff.
I’ve also found I love Bluegrass, but oddly enough, there are no radio stations here that ever play it. You’ve actually got a better chance of hearing an Irish reel than a Bluegrass one…in Arkansas. Strange, huh?
–James
i believe the newer old-style country now goes under the designation “Americana”.
check out Gillian Welch, you won’t be disappointed.
To check whether any given song is properly to be regarded as a true C&W song, it should be checked for content against this song, which was specifically designed to contain all the necessary elements:
Country & Western Supersong, by Billy Connolly
Yes my granny is a cripple in Nashville, friends
This story I tell you is true
One day she went out on her wheelchair
Never knowing it had a loose screw
Well a wheel came off of that wheelchair, friends
And on three wheels it trundled away
And it trundled right over the edge of a cliff
In an old seaside town far away
A-dee-oh-lay-hee, oh-lay-hee, oh-lay-hee,
Wooh-wooh-ooh-ooh.
Now the boy who was pushing the wheelchair
Was a little blind orphan call Joe
And he said, “Oh where is my grannie?
And where did that damn wheelchair go?”
Well he ran off to search for that wheelchair friends
But his sightless eyes led him astray
And he ran right over the edge of the cliff
In that old seaside town far away
A-dee-oh-lay-hee, oh-lay-hee, oh-lay-hee,
Wooh-wooh-ooh-ooh.
Well somebody sent for a doctor
And an ambulance too, it was called
And the people who lived in the neighbourhood
Stood around and they cried, how they bawled
Well the doctor and the ambulance came rushing, friends
They were rushing from two different ways
And they crashed with a BIFF and shot over the cliff
In that old seaside town far away
A-dee-oh-lay-hee, oh-lay-hee, oh-lay-hee,
Wooh-wooh-ooh-ooh.
Well they sent for brave Father Maloney
To pray for the poor souls’ repose
And he said, “Well now that we’re gathered here, good people,
Well we might as well pray, I suppose”
But too many people had gathered
And the edge of the cliff gave way
And they dropped with a yell and they all shot straight to hell
In that old seaside town so terribly far away
A-dee-oh-lay-hee, oh-lay-hee, oh-lay-hee,
Wooh-wooh-ooh-ooh.
A few years ago a local country radio station had a tv add that started out with a pickup truck in center screen and bluegrass music playing in the background. Then you heard the sound of a needle being scrapped over a record and the announcer said, “Well, you won’t hear any of that type of country music on our station.”
Needless to say I’ve never been tempted to listen to them.
There is good country music to be found, you just won’t find it on the radio. In an odd twist the Coen Brother’s O](http://imdb.com/title/tt0190590/%22%3EO) Brother, Where Art Thou? brought good music to the foreground for quite a while. The documentary Down](http://imdb.com/title/tt0284067/%22%3EDown) from the Mountain, which shows behind the scenes of a concert by the performers from the soundtrack, is a must see.
I’m in love with Gillian Welch…and Alison Krauss…and Emmylou Harriss…and Naci Griffith…and…
One more thing, I highly recommend Lost](http://www.tv.com/lost-highway/show/28293/summary.html%22%3ELost) Highway ,ironically by the BBC. It’s a fantastic history of country music narrated by Lyle Lovett. He’s another favorite of mine, and not just because he lives a ways over from me.
Good:
“He Stopped Loving Her Today”–George Jones
Bad:
“Achy Breaky Heart” by Billy Ray Cyrus.
Good:
“Guitars and Cadillacs” by Dwight Yoakam
My dad always used to say that country/western was for anybody who couldn’t make it in any other kind of music. I had to laugh when I saw the liner notes on a c/w album (and for the life of me, I can’t remember who it was–a man with a white beard, I think? - very famous)–and it said something like “he tried rock and soul [a whole list of music types here] but finally found country/western.”
Susan
I would tend to agree, with the exception of Brad Paisley, Trace Adkins, and Big & Rich.
No Bluegrass here, either. Actually, Fort Smith probably has more in common with Oklahoma and Texas than it does with the rest of Arkansas.
The problem with our C&W stations is that they are still Carrie-crazy. We do, however, have some good classic rock, rock oldies, and country oldies stations. The Spanish-language station sometimes plays some good tunes, too. 
I have gone through periods where I really liked Country and Western and although I don’t really seek it out right now I’d sure like to be able to get it on the radio in the car, but there’s nothing on. It used to be that you could always find a C&W station but now anything resembling that kind of music ends up mostly being what I would call Country Rock. I’m not up on that music at all now, and I’m sure there are exceptions, but it’s a sad state of affairs. If I had a long drive, that kind of music would really help get me through it. I don’t know, maybe if I listened more I’d find more I liked.
What I would call just plain country music and bluegrass have never been very available on the radio to me in Iowa—just a few special shows on a couple of stations and you’d have to know the schedule to hear them. In CA there was a great bluegrass station called KFAT, but I’m sure it doesn’t exist anymore. I’m not too surprised that there isn’t much bluegrass, but real C&W had such a big audience. I guess the audience changed.
I went to a Robin and Linda Williams show—not saying they are country—and he commented about how they had to drive so much and it was really sad that they couldn’t get any kind of good country music on the radio anymore.
A country oldie station sounds like something I would really like.
the stuff they call country now is just southern rock from the 70’s, performed by “pretty” guys!!!
I grew up listening to real C&W - Bob Wills, Hank Sr., etc., along with almost every Chet Atkins and Les Paul album out there. On Saturday evenings there used to be a concert by the people on “Midwestern Hayride” from WLW held on the farm the repeater for their antenae was on.
While we play a lot of bluegrass, I honestly prefer to listen to old time over bluegrass. I prefer a good clawhammer banjo player over 5 finger roll style any day.
That would be 3-finger actually, but I’m right with you there. Bluegrass had its heyday, and it rocked, but the “newgrass” is, to me, no more pleasing than “country pop”. Oldtime music just continues to get better, (and I’m talking about the new artists here).
I’ve never developed an appreciation for country western music. Don’t know why, the rest of my family loves it. But it don’t do nothin for me. 
C&W is about ALL you can find on radio around here. New and old style and everything in between.
I don’t like it, never did. I’m talking the classic beer drinkin’, cheatin’, layin’ drunk, heartbroken stuff and the “southern rock/country hybrid” stuff that’s played now. I do like quiet a bit of what’s termed “Americana” and absoultely LOVE “old time”. I’m only a short distance from “the birthplace of country music” and believe me we are saturated.
The only time I ever did enjoy country(I’m talking mid to late 60s stuff here), is when we were kids. A bunch of us use to gather with our guitars, banjos, spoons, etc. and play those old songs and get some good laughs out of them. The old time stuff our parents played was not to be made fun of, but country? We couldn’t resist. We’ve still got reel to reel tapes of some of those music makin’s. This year, on my birthday cd that my brother always makes for me, he included Porter Wagoner’s “Cold Hard Facts of Life” that includes the classic line"so I drank a fifth of courage and walked in". 
I’m still laughing out loud at that one way too many years later. “Fallen Angel” is another one we had fun with.
What the heck- here goes with these classic lyrics-
The Cold Hard Facts of Life by Ferlin Husky
I got back in town a day before I’d planned to
I smiled and said I’ll sure surprise my wife
I don’t think I’ll phone I’ll just head on home
For I didn’t know the cold hard facts of life
I passed a little winestore on the corner I pictured pink champagne by candle light
I stopped the car right then got out and hurried in
My mind not on the cold hard facts of life
A stranger stood there laughing by the counter
He said I’ll take two bottles of your best
Her husband’s out of town and there’s a party
He winkled as if to say you know the rest
I left the store two steps behind the stranger
From there to my house his car stayed in sight
But it wasn’t till he turned into my drive I learned
I was witnessing the cold hard facts of life
I drove around the block till I was dizzy each time the noise came louder from within
And then I saw our bottle there beside me
And I drank a fifth of courage and walked in
Oh you should have seen their frantic faces
They screamed and cried please put away that knife
I guess I’ll go to hell or rot here in the cell
But who taught who the cold hard facts of life
who told who the cold hard facts of life
BORROWED ANGEL byMel Street (the true king of cheating songs)
Her fingers feel so gentle with her hand in mine
Her hair feels like silk on my arm
Her lips tell me so tenderly she’s mine alone
Until we part tonight and she goes home
Borrowed angel belongs to someone else
I love my borrowed angel I just can’t help myself
That ring on her finger don’t belong to me
But she loves me and I know she’ll save some borrowed time for me
[ steel ]
I wish that I could have her more than just tonight
We can’t go on like this it isn’t right
When that lonesome feeling comes knocking on my door
I’ll call my borrowed angel to ease the pain once more
Borrowed angel…
But she loves me and I know she’ll save some borrowed time for me
OH NO… now I’ve got this on my m-i-n-d… 
I’ve gotta go to youtube…
I imagine radio stations try to play what they think the people who buy the products advertized on them.
Lately I’ve been listening to KBON on internet radio. There’s quite a bit of C&W to be found there along with the Swamp Pop and more traditional Cajun and Creole music but its home grown C&W.
Most of it is either from Louisiana or very Louisiana influenced.
KBON is owned by a guy and his wife. When they realized their audience was limited because of the kind of music they choose to play on their station, they started offering subscriptions on the internet.
Actually, they play what the big record companies tell them to play. Advertisers have no say in this. Incredibly, even the “celtic” stations that are coming out are the same way: they play what the record companies tell them to play, so you’re never likely to hear much in the way of Seamus Ennis, but you’ll hear all the new celtic pop groups that are currently releasing albums. Radio has always worked this way.
djm
Very few modern country music performers do I like. The few are:
Dolly Parton
Emmylou Harris
Shaniah Twain
k.d. Lang
Sinéad O’Connor
The last two (Lang and O’Connor) only sing country music sometimes, but when they do it’s ten kinds of awesome.
I also like the Dixie Chicks, but I don’t really think of them as country.