Break out the bubbly!

I'm sure all of us have those humorous contradictions about ourselves that not only can we not explain to ourselves, but not to other people either. For instance, I love ketchup but I hate tomatoes. I love red and orange, but not yellow. But a contradiction I found right on my own iPod is this...I am a steadfast fan of 90's country music, and generally baulk at pop-country, but yet sometimes I find my thumb spinning on that white wheel, selecting a Shania Twain or Faith Hill song, and abruptly the mountain pine scented twangs and sweet melodies of Patty Loveless give way to electric guitars, sugar-coated lyrics that pop into your ears and roll around your tongue like so many sugar cookies crumbling in your mouth.

Not that I'm saying the mostly traditional 90's country music I listen to - or at least what I consider to be true country - is the complete opposite of decadently crumbling sugar cookies topped with crimson and white sugar morsels, but I guess when I think of Faith Hill's song The Way You Love Me and This Kiss I just imagine her writing the song - or whoever wrote it - inventing the lyrics amidst a glimmering, growing pile of Hershey's Kisses wrappers and yes, more sugar cookies. Another funny thing is, is that up until a few year ago I never even liked This Kiss. Now? It's not only on my iPod, but it's elbowed its way to that elite number of songs that is always right there whenever I turn it on, waiting to be selected, or jump into line whenever I select shuffle.

So, what is it about these 90's pop-country songs I find so appealing? Why, after so many years of either turning down the volume or switching stations whenever This Kiss or even Shania Twain came on? To help answer this question, perhaps I should go back to how I began listening to country in the first place. And since I have covered such a story before, I'll try to practice brevity. Don't think I didn't see you roll your eyes just now. Practice brevity? Really? Yes! I said it, and this time I'm keeping a firm grip on this train, I won't let it derail onto yet another weed-tangled, shadow-drenched path where no doubt tantalizing metaphors and stories await but...they'll still be there, stored away in some already overstuffed filing cabinet in my mind. Think of them as that junk you have on the floor of your closet, or stuffed in the attic. You feel its weight, its presence of just being there, but for what? You know the day after you get rid of it, you'll know, and that's exactly when you wish you had that frustration back, that pain of turning away from it, even as it accumulates like dust beneath your bed.

Well, that was a minor derailing, fixed with but a little nudge. See! Back on track already! As I was saying, I was going to address how I got to listening to country music. Well, the condensed version is this: one night a friend - also a country music listener - decided to play a Shania Twain song, and also a favorite Big & Rich song. Instantly I loved both songs and went out and bought the albums, and thus opened up my exposure to country music. Now obviously you can see such exposure was all pop oriented, and thus would why - when I received my first iPod - I compiled lists full of songs by...Taylor Swift. Now, thankfully, I know better, and my iPod is free of her music, but I've found over the past two years I've grown to love Shania Twain again, but ironically I rarely listen to Big & Rich anymore. Perhaps it's their style of music that wears on me, or perhaps I've just simply outgrown them, like I have with Jump5's music. Albeit I will confess I still listen to their 2002 hit All I Can Do on YouTube every once in a while. I'll warn you right now, that songs rivals the strongest drug out there by way of addiction. And back in middle school and early high school, I was addicted!

So perhaps because I was introduced to country music via the pop side of it, such is the reason I find myself listening to This Kiss and The Way You Love Me. Perhaps this time around, being wiser in the ways of Nashville and what true country music is - again to me, anyway - I can revisit the pop side of country and make my selections, steering clear of the artists Nashville has labeled country when the only thing country about them is the cowboy boots and...I'll get back to you on the second one. I was going to say acoustic guitar, but that's just too vague isn't it? Every bloody performer out there about uses an acoustic guitar? I believe Nashville is blurring the lines on country music, opening its doors wide and allowing talentless groups and solo-artists to come stumbling over their thresholds, drunk on the prospect of making a buck and a life on meaningless songs and hiding behind a false facade of make-up and skimpy clothes.

Okay, I know, cynical me climbing out onto the balcony for a little screaming over my normal voice modestly calling out today's blog, but no worries, I've shoved her back into her room and locked the door. I must admit though, that did feel rather good. But then again, I feel like somewhat of a hypocrite, talking down Nashville's current antics and its bludgeoning of country music, when I myself listen to music labeled as country but so far removed from it that if such songs were apples fallen from the first tree of country, you'd be standing in an open field, not an apple tree in sight. Then I remind myself, that's 90's pop country you're listening to, back when artists produced true music and had true talent, and I find myself thinking "yeah! After all, it's not like I listen to today's pop-country right? At least not as regularly and in bulk as I do with the 90's material. So there again, is a story to be told. And I could in fact argue against my feeling like a hypocrite by saying: albeit pop-country in the 90's still wasn't country in the purest sense, but at least back then artists like Faith Hill and Shania Twain had actual talent! I haven't tuned in to a country radio station in probably a year or more because of the deterioration of the material being played.

I think I've addressed all of this before in a past blog post, so I don't want to get into a whole music rant again. But I guess what I will say about particular artists is this: Tim McGraw's 90's and early 2000's albums were amazing. In fact, his albums All I Want Is A Life - 90's - and his 2002 album Set This Circus Down are my two favorites by him. why? Because that was when he was caught up in the magic of the 90's, and the magic of 90's pop-music. Now? I can't stand to listen to the singles he has. And albeit I realize it's all personal preference, and yes my love affair with all things old - and basically from the 90's - might be more than a little influence for the strong stance I have - I can recognize a surrendering to Nashville's current plight when I hear it, and I'm sure I'm not alone on this. I go back to the 90's because - to me at least - that was when so many artists were in their pinnacle, including Tim McGraw. What happened? I would like to ask him myself. Of course, he probably wouldn't see anything wrong, as would millions of other fans filling up his concerts and buying his latest album.

Which makes me feel like a minority, which in inevitably how I normally feel whenever I voice my tastes in music, TV shows, and other interests. I know my brother has criticized me more than once on such tastes and interests. I mean, just look at Nashville today, and even at pop-music without the 'flimsy country label' attached to it, there's even less talent there - again, just my opinion. But that's what the public is demanding, and thus that is what the record companies produce. All those artists I love and listen to today, had their glory days int he 90's, and now? Their like old dusty records and awards stowed away in the attic, sometimes falling out of moldy boxes and crates to weight upon the minds of the aged musicians and singers they belong to, to perhaps urge them to do something, or just remind them that music once was honorable, and full of talented people, and it can be that way again.

I hope that didn't sound too dramatic, and I also hope I didn't sound too forceful in my opinions. Because frankly, I'm not that way in the least. Obviously, I have digressed more than a little, but at least I kept to the subject of music right? To close, whatever my reason for listening to This Kiss when there was a time when I couldn't stand it, I can sleep at night knowing now I am armed with knowledge against country music's current deception and can crank a Patty Loveless tune, or perhaps Pam Tillis, Suzy Bogguss, or any other of those artists that weight against the floorboards of my own attic, my memory full of 90's relics that still shine brilliantly underneath their thick blankets of dust.