CMT
So Matt and I spent two hours watching the Country Music Channel, trying to figure out what, if anything, we were missing. Conclusions:
1. The South is every bit as bad as you think. Just horrible, horrible, horrible.
2. Every song just had the worst god-awful lyrics, which got me to thinking if there were any actually sophisticated or well-written songs in country music or if there ever have been. I couldn't come up with any. If anyone has a country music equivalent to "Sympathy for the Devil," "Lovely Rita," or "Desolation Row," I'm all ears.
3. Country music is incredibly difficult to categorize. I tried explaining to Matt the following: why Jimmy Buffet is now liked; why Faith Hill is less of a sellout than Shania Twain; why premarital sex is covered so throughly (Matt felt they were conservative and should have been condemning it: I felt all of them had knocked up someone or been knocked up by the time they were 16); why shit that was practically EMO was on CMT (No idea); why there were so many painfully bad opening lines (Southerners are the worst storytellers, except for William Faulkner); why there were so many barefoot pregnant women (the knocked up theory); why having a banjo and electric guitar solo in the same song would make Chuck Berry and Hank Williams roll out of their graves and begin killing each other; why anyone who uses an electric base instead of a standup is not truly country; why the Nashville scene has been fucked up since the late 60's.
4. Possibly the least sexual thing ever: some self-proclaimed broad, Gretchen Wilson, explaining that she had the same dip in her mouth for two hours without spitting before singing one of her trademark songs about being a filthy drunk. Ewwwwwwwwwww. This woman is trashy, and not in the Marla Singer "so trashy it's hot" way. This is more like "your brother brought home a barefoot pregnant woman who was dipping because she didn't want the smoke to hurt the baby: we will never speak to him again, and let's pray that his seeds get wiped from the earth" trashy.
5. We get it. You drive a pickup truck, have a tumultuous past with at least one of your parents, someone (or everyone) in your family is an alcoholic, 1 of every 3 women in the South is barefoot and pregnant, Jesus rocks, anyone protesting our government in any way is evil and unpatriotic; you're simple folk who like simple stories. Also, you're dirty, trashy, and inexplicably proud of this. Black people and minorities? I'm not sure about this since there weren't any, but I'm betting you don't like them much. Johnny Cash, Kris Kristofferson, Willie Nelson, and Waylon Jennings were cool. Uncle Kracker, Tim McGraw, Alan Jackson, and Gretchen Wilson are not. Why am I the only person that sees this? I hate you so much CMT!
I hope every sunbelt state falls into the ocean, preferably before November. PEOPLE WHO WATCH CMT will choose our next president because they actually vote and they're not going to not vote for a guy they've seen in a cowboy hat! "I've said it before and I'll say it again: democracy doesn't work."
1. The South is every bit as bad as you think. Just horrible, horrible, horrible.
2. Every song just had the worst god-awful lyrics, which got me to thinking if there were any actually sophisticated or well-written songs in country music or if there ever have been. I couldn't come up with any. If anyone has a country music equivalent to "Sympathy for the Devil," "Lovely Rita," or "Desolation Row," I'm all ears.
3. Country music is incredibly difficult to categorize. I tried explaining to Matt the following: why Jimmy Buffet is now liked; why Faith Hill is less of a sellout than Shania Twain; why premarital sex is covered so throughly (Matt felt they were conservative and should have been condemning it: I felt all of them had knocked up someone or been knocked up by the time they were 16); why shit that was practically EMO was on CMT (No idea); why there were so many painfully bad opening lines (Southerners are the worst storytellers, except for William Faulkner); why there were so many barefoot pregnant women (the knocked up theory); why having a banjo and electric guitar solo in the same song would make Chuck Berry and Hank Williams roll out of their graves and begin killing each other; why anyone who uses an electric base instead of a standup is not truly country; why the Nashville scene has been fucked up since the late 60's.
4. Possibly the least sexual thing ever: some self-proclaimed broad, Gretchen Wilson, explaining that she had the same dip in her mouth for two hours without spitting before singing one of her trademark songs about being a filthy drunk. Ewwwwwwwwwww. This woman is trashy, and not in the Marla Singer "so trashy it's hot" way. This is more like "your brother brought home a barefoot pregnant woman who was dipping because she didn't want the smoke to hurt the baby: we will never speak to him again, and let's pray that his seeds get wiped from the earth" trashy.
5. We get it. You drive a pickup truck, have a tumultuous past with at least one of your parents, someone (or everyone) in your family is an alcoholic, 1 of every 3 women in the South is barefoot and pregnant, Jesus rocks, anyone protesting our government in any way is evil and unpatriotic; you're simple folk who like simple stories. Also, you're dirty, trashy, and inexplicably proud of this. Black people and minorities? I'm not sure about this since there weren't any, but I'm betting you don't like them much. Johnny Cash, Kris Kristofferson, Willie Nelson, and Waylon Jennings were cool. Uncle Kracker, Tim McGraw, Alan Jackson, and Gretchen Wilson are not. Why am I the only person that sees this? I hate you so much CMT!
I hope every sunbelt state falls into the ocean, preferably before November. PEOPLE WHO WATCH CMT will choose our next president because they actually vote and they're not going to not vote for a guy they've seen in a cowboy hat! "I've said it before and I'll say it again: democracy doesn't work."