Popular Country music Bands

Alana Lynn, a morning co-host on country songs place 104.3 FM in Boise, Idaho, ended up being excited to play Little Big Town’s most recent single on her listeners. “Girl Crush, ” a robust ballad about a female envious of her ex-boyfriend’s new gf, seemed destined becoming popular.

“I want to taste her lips, yeah trigger they taste as you / I want to drown myself in a container of her perfume, ” vocalist Karen Fairchild sings. “i'd like the woman long blond hair, Needs her secret touch / Yeah cause maybe then, you’d desire me just as much. . . I Acquired a girl crush.”

Certain, it’s a provocative solution to describe jealousy. However when Lynn played the track from the environment, she didn’t anticipate that she would get furious telephone calls and emails accusing “Girl Crush” of “promoting the homosexual agenda” and threats to boycott the station. The past time she heard anywhere near this much outrage from listeners? “The Dixie Chicks’ President Bush opinions, ” Lynn recalls, referring to if the trio’s career imploded in 2003 after making vital statements in regards to the president.

Are you surprised because of the fury over Little Big Town — particularly great deal of thought’s an entire misrepresentation of these words? Lynn doesn’t play the track in the morning any longer after parents complained they didn’t wish their particular young ones hearing it. However it’s not only in Idaho: In current days, several radio stations from coast to coast were overwhelmed with similar grievances about “Girl Crush, ” forcing several to remove it of a frequent rotation. (Sample opinions heard by a Texas program manager: “You are simply promoting the gay agenda on your place and I also have always been switching the channel and not playing you again!!”)

Consequently, the track is mired in an arduous climb on the radio charts, and has now ignited a debate that is symbolic of this fraught state of nation radio.

There’s a deep chasm today between what’s preferred on nation radio — still the genre’s strongest platform — and exactly what fans are in reality buying: “Girl Crush” is #4 on iTunes, but lags at No. 33 in radio ratings. Even though nation songs sometimes appears as more progressive now — with specific lyrics about intercourse and casual marijuana usage — significant portions regarding the traditional market won't tolerate a song they also wrongly believe is mostly about a same-sex commitment.

Syndicated radio character Bobby Bones, just who hosts the nation’s most widely used country morning show, fumed about this topic to his scores of audience a week ago while Little Big Town was in the studio. “Is it irritating to you that listed here is your track — this is certainly the top ten vendors for months and months and weeks — and individuals in the radio are still afraid to relax and play it simply because they think it is a ‘lesbian tune?’” he asked. “It would drive me personally outrageous!”

The group conformed. “simply the fact that we’re nonetheless speaking about that, number 1, there’s so many difficulties with that whole concern, ” Fairchild stated.

“It shouldn’t also matter if it is a lesbian song, is the initial thing, ” Bones added. Though, of course, that has actually proven to matter. Take a look at Kacey Musgraves and “Follow Your Arrow, ” the track referencing same-sex kissing that racked up awards and product sales but struggled to find a radio market. Even in 2015, the niche is still a taboo in genre.

an anonymous Texas program manager, who blogged a long post concerning the tune for songs web log for Country Record, is irritated that audience refuse to acknowledge the real meaning behind the words. “Country music fans, please try to have an open head about songs you will be hearing regarding the radio these days if you don’t like them, that’s good, ” the manager composed. “But don’t not like them for the wrong close-minded explanations.”

The backlash is disheartening the Grammy-winning musical organization, which has been delighted by positive lover reaction and sales figures (“Girl Crush” is offering about 25, 000 copies weekly) but disappointed because of the radio effect. Fairchild remembers whenever she and other team user Kimberly Schlapman initially heard the tune, penned by veteran Nashville songwriters Liz Rose, Lori McKenna and Hillary Lindsey. At Rose’s house during a “girls’ writers day, ” Fairchild and Schlapman paid attention to the songwriter trio perform the tune — and instantly clicked it up for Little Big Town’s after that album.