BITES // 04.04.24 // COUNTRY MUSIC TAKEOVER
Every month we collect six of the best pieces of content published on the web and share them with you because we believe that the most extraordinary thinking is inspired by looking to unexpected places. BITES is a reading list for those who want to bring a little of the outside in.
OVERVIEW -
For a genre of music that has rarely gone mainstream, country music is now coming to dominate the industry with country music streaming growing 24% YoY through Q3 2023. Gen Z and millennials are driving the surge in the country music genre. In 2023, 36% of streams of Spotify’s Top 50 songs were country songs, compared to 2% in 2016. We’re seeing country music embraced by the masses like never before thanks to a new crop of superstars and songwriters that are breaking down musical barriers and expressing themselves in fresh and dynamic ways.
1. BEYONCÉ GOES COUNTRY WITH “COWBOY CARTER”
In an elaborate series of teaser videos, Beyonce dropped the long-awaited “Act II” of her 2022 “Renaissance” album that leans heavily into the country genre with Cowboy Carter. Beyoncé grew up in Texas, where country music has long mingled with styles from jazz to blues to hip-hop. She announced the new country album at the Super Bowl during a Verizon ad. “Texas Hold ‘Em” is almost entirely acoustic guitars, bass drum and vocals, with a chorus. The idea of whether country radios would accept or ignore Beyoncé’s new music became a hot topic in the music industry, radio stations were initially reluctant to play her two new singles on country radio stations saying that they don’t consider Beyonce’s songs to be country enough to play on their stations. A country music radio station in Oklahoma that refused to play Beyoncé’s “Texas Hold ‘Em” has changed course and is now playing the song after receiving criticism of being racist by not playing her new songs. Cowboy Carter is another volume in Beyoncé’s years-long project to surface and pay tribute to Black culture. Fans online have theorized that Beyoncé’s latest projects including her house album Renaissance are about claiming back music created by Black people. Billboard described the album as “a jaw-dropping ode to the breadth of regional and musical subcultures of the American South”, that finds Beyoncé “more experimental and more fearless than ever before”. Cowboy Carter is also a flex, with Beyoncé proffering what may be one of the most expensive albums ever made in terms of royalties. Her breakthrough in country has helped increase streams of Black women in country including Tanner Adell, Reyna Roberts, and Rhiannon Giddens.
2. POST MALONE, LANA DEL REY & ED SHEERAN RELEASING COUNTRY ALBUMS
Post Malone has confirmed his country album is in the works. During a recent Twitch livestream on his channel, the rapper was asked in the chat a few times about his venture into the genre. Photos showing Malone in the studio with artists including Morgan Wallen, Ernest and Brad Paisley were related to his forthcoming country project. The photos popped up just days before his debut performance on the CMA Awards alongside Morgan Wallen and Hardy. The album is a tribute to the late Joe Diffie and features recordings from the singer combined with vocals from current artists. Malone has already released his posthumous duet with Diffie on “Pickup Man” that has already landed him on the country music charts, as it debuted at №56 on Billboard’s Country Airplay Chart dated November 18. An unreleased song with Morgan Wallen and Malone as recently released. While there isn’t an official album set to release, pop star Ed Sheeran has spent considerable time in Nashville over the years. During rehearsals for the 2023 Academy of Country Music Awards, where he ultimately performed a collaboration with Luke Combs on “Life Goes On”, Sheeran said he would “love to transition into country — I love the culture of it, I just love the songwriting. It’s just like brilliant songs.” During this year’s Billboard and NMPA Songwriter Awards celebration, Lana Del Rey announced her upcoming album, Lasso, that is expected to release in September will have a country-infused sound. Lana said, “if you can’t already tell by our award winners and our performers, the music business is going country. We’re going country. It’s happening.” Lana posted a teaser of a song titled “Henry, Come On” on Instagram, and tagged writer-producer Luke Laird, known for his work with country fixtures like Kacey Musgraves and Little Big Town. In December, she also released a cover of the John Denver classic “Take Me Home, Country Roads.” Lasso will follow her 2023 album Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd, which reached №3 on the Billboard 200.
3. BRIAN WILSON IS SET TO RELEASE OLD SCHOOL COUNTRY
Brian Wilson and longtime Beach Boys manager Fred Vail are set to release a long-shelved 1970s album of country classics next year. In 1970, the Beach Boys frontman and solo artist, Brian Wilson, was working on a country music album with the band’s manager, Fred Vail. Nothing happened with the project until Vail met with fan and producer Sam Parker. The 1970 tapes came into Vail’s possession ten years ago and suggested that the pair finish the album. The instrumental tracks for the album, feature Vail on vocals. The outlet reports that the album is titled Cows in the Pasture and that it includes features from several yet-to-be-named special guests. Wilson and Vail originally worked on the project with musicians including guitarist James Burton (Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Merle Haggard), steel guitarist Red Rhodes (James Taylor, Ronstadt, The Byrds) and piano player Glen D. Hardin (Buck Owens, Dean Martin, Dwight Yoakam). They’ve remained tight-lipped about the guests who will feature on the album, only confirming that T-Bone Burnett is involved. Parker teased, “They’re country music legends, they’re rock & roll legends, contemporary country, and pop stars too.” Parker also revealed that he and Wilson are working on a four-part docuseries about the mystery album, with the first episode telling Vail’s story. His voice has changed a lot since the original recordings, with the team planning a Johnny Cash-like approach to the album and accepting aging.
4. MORGAN WALLEN IS DRIVING THE GENRE’S POPULARITY
Through the third quarter of 2023, country music’s on-demand audio and video streaming grew by 24% year over year and Wallen accounted for 31% of that growth. Of all country music on-demand streams through the same period, 10% belonged to Wallen. Wallen, alongside Luke Combs is the tip of the spear for the genre’s new generation, which includes Zach Bryan, Lainey Wilson, Jelly Roll, Bailey Zimmerman and Wallen’s frequent writing partner and close friend, HARDY. He has shifted country’s streaming calculus by releasing albums that contain more than 30 tracks and racking up tremendous consumption tallies: One Thing at a Time’s songs earned 498.3 million on-demand streams in its first week, the most ever for a country album. For the first time since the 2013 launch of the year-end Streaming Songs Artists chart, Wallen leads the list, and a country song (“Last Night”) was the number one on the year-end Streaming Songs chart. Wallen’s groundbreaking accomplishments are transcending the country genre, too. When “Last Night” hit №1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in March, it became the first song by a solo male country artist to top the chart since Eddie Rabbitt’s “I Love a Rainy Night” in 1981. He’s catching the eye of legendary country artists, who now study his methods.
5. BAD BUNNY MOST WANTED TOUR GIVES WESTERN VIBES
He first announced the “Most Wanted Tour” in a way only he could: with flair, mystery, and a touch of the Wild West. The reggaeton star took to his social media platforms, donning a cowboy ensemble, complete with a horse and a ski mask concealing his identity. The fashion from Bad Bunny along with his fans is all about the fringe, cowboy boots, hats, and more with fans leaning into that cowboy aesthetic, like Beyonce’s Renaissance tour, when choosing their outfits. The vibe for Bad Bunny’s new tour is all about the cowboy aesthetic, with fans adopting western wear, cowboy boots and hats as outfit inspiration for the shows. Bad Bunny is touring with two horses, Bucky and Trumpet, along with their owners and trainers. As expected, fans roared at the sight of Bad Bunny on a horse, which is perhaps the first time a reggaeton artist incorporated a horse in their show — though there was backlash from PETA that slammed Bad Bunny, calling him “irresponsible” for using the horse “for your spectacle.”
6. EMO-COUNTRY IS BECOMING A THING
After a decade of singing about tailgates, trucks, dogs, beer and parties that never end, country has been getting in touch with its feelings lately. Introspective songs like “Hey Driver” and “Heading South”, Zach Bryan made country cool again. The band 49 Winchester with Charles Wesley Godwin, Dylan Gossett and Wyatt Flores are all dabbling in a subgenre best described as “emo-country”. Flores released a cover of the Fray’s pleading 2006 hit “How to Save a Life.” And while the dudes, like always, are at the forefront of the commercial boom, singers like Morgan Wade and Kaitlin Butts are tearing hearts out with the best of them. Expect to hear more truck-dash confessions this year. Jimmy Butler debuted his emo look. The Miami Heat player arrived at media day with straightened hair, painted fingernails and piercings. Social media users quickly noticed Butler’s new look and couldn’t help but equate his hairstyle to that of emo bands of the early 2000s — like Secondhand Serenade, Fall Out Boy, and Panic! at the Disco. He also announced that he has a goal of producing a country music album.
