If you listen to pop radio you’ve noticed country stars showing up on the playlists more and more. If you watch awards shows, country artists and country music categories are featured more and more. ABC’s Nashville is a huge television success. And country seems to be taking over singing reality competitions (Tate Stevens won The X Factor, and let us not forget Blake Shelton is The Voice’s reigning champ two seasons in a row… and by the way, Cassadee Pope, last season’s winner, has just signed with country label Big Machine). So why has “mainstream” fallen in love with country music?
It’s simple: “Mainstream” isn’t coming around to country. Country is going to it. Not in a conformist way, but a revolutionary way.
“What is country music, really?” is a topic debated ad nauseum, and I won’t touch it. I’m far from knowing where the exact line is that separates country music from not country music; however, there is certainly no need to hold the country music genre captive in a box anymore. Those boxes are obsolete.
