At one point in time, we had good old country music coming from artists such as Johnny Cash, (young) Taylor Swift, Tim McGraw and more. It has now fallen into the overwhelming abyss of pop culture, and it needs to stop.

Mainstream country used to be categorized in one way, coming from the bluegrass roots down south. Using instruments such as banjos, acoustic guitars, and the human voice, it had its own distinct sound. With that sound still being quite the annoyance, it was hard to sit through a song on the radio in the first place. But with improvement of music enhancing technology such as synthesizers, soundboards, and auto tune, country lost its once original sound, and became arguably worse. A prime example of this new and improved pop-country is the song Old Town Road by Lil Nas X feat. Billy Ray Cyrus. Though it may be a bop, and one of the biggest memes of the year, that is not country. Not even a little bit. Jewly Hight from NPR says that it takes “…established stars with credibility to burn …subtly or significantly shifting the genre’s center, before something completely different comes along to catch the public’s ear.” What’s essentially being said by not just me, but NPR as well, is that the country music industry really needs some improvement. Which may be quitting the country game all together.

And personally, what’s the appeal to the sound-cloud inspired beats with just an extra bit of acoustic guitar? Don’t we all have something, or anything else we can listen too? Out of 459 people surveyed, 57% of them agreed with me in the sense that country now is really not worth the listen. And to the other 43% who said they like the good old/new country, it’s okay to have your own opinions. I get if you like listening to a nice twangy love song, or a more country gone pop artist like Taylor Swift. I’m not here to tell you what you can and cannot listen to. All I’m at liberty to say is I personally could give you some recommendations that could,  and would far exceed any country song or album you’ve ever listened to. So if you’re ever ready to hop off the tractor, and get away from the old town road, come find me. I’ve got plenty of music to potentially change your taste.