A fact, to which most of you who know me can attest, is that I like country music in pretty much all of its stripes. I can throw down at an alt.country show, am somewhat of a regular at The Firehouse for Red Dirt Music, and have some Nashville types that don’t make me puke. Last night, and I wished this had been a nightmare, I watched two shows on cable: Open Country and The Edge of Country. What I expected were shows that were the television equivalent of X Country (my favorite XM station back when I had XM). What I got on the first show was a series of videos that at best were Southern Alternative (yes I am coining a new genre in this post). The only thing country about them was a little bit, maybe, if you listened, of twang in the singers voice. Not a single fiddle, steel guitar, or any of the rhythms that comprise anything known as country. The videos were all artsy and bad and the lack of cowboy hats just added to the whole mess. It was not a country music show by any stretch. It was some sort of strange-almost-Southern-Alternative. It didn’t even qualify for alt.country. It made me mindful of Hank III’s “Dick in Dixie”

(If you want to listen to some real country while reading the rest of this rant click the banner.)

The second one (Edge of Country) started off much better with Billy Joe Shaver’s new video “Get Thee Behind Me Satan” which could spark a whole post on its own. However it went downhill fast eventually degrading into the country version of “Everyone is Kung Fu Fighting - The Video” by someone called Uncle Ed. The music was bluegrass but the video was just confusing. I had to turn off the show at that point. It had become too damn weird: from the British host (yeah I know…) trying to fake a southern accent to the kung fu video it was all too damn much. I am still scarred. I even pinched the wife to make sure I was awake! I tried muting the host to make it further into the show but her gesticulation was even worse without sound. It was painful to watch. I don’t know what the networks are thinking but if they want to be cutting edge country then they at least need to play country.

I have spent the day scrubbing my brain by listening to Radio Free Texas (see banner above) and doing penance for my transgressions by signing up for the street team. I only hope I can purge the evil that infected my brain by supporting real music. If country ain’t your thing then drop on over to Nine Bullets and dig on some the music my boy is writing about.