Your Take: Bad List, Good List?

“However, the talent of many of these artists would be less noteworthy if their contemporaries were more capable.”

I believe it was the great Ralph Emery who said, ‘We have allowed a great deal of mediocrity to slip into an industry where, at one time, only veterans and great ones stood.’

Mediocrity sums it up real good in a word. Laziness? Maybe not so much. Because at the vein of this decline in the quality of country radio, there are hard-working people. It’s evident when you turn on CMT or GAC or browse an artists’ website that somewhere along the line someone took the initiative to go through all the motions - and some of them damn well, I might add - of kick-starting the artists’ career in every avenue of reaching out to the fans, the consumers.

But when the product itself is mediocre, the consumer will reject it, no matter how the slick the wrapper. Country music fans may not be the first to throw back mediocre, and in some cases just plain terrible, works from even their favorite artists. Case in point: Garth’s Chris Gaines album. Yes, it sold 2 million copies, but that’s really pitiful by Garth’s standards. Just ask him.

So, even country fans - the most loyal on the planet - have a limit to what they’ll accept in terms of quality from artists, whether they are life-long fans or not.

I was thinking about this very topic not too long ago. Ever since I read the review for Brad Paisley’s “I’m Still A Guy” on this site, I’ve noticed lists in songs more. I see the point of why lists can be considered lazy, but I’ve never minded songs with lists for the most part.

For instance, Alan Jackson’s “Where Were You” is, what I consider, a list song. However, I wouldn’t consider it to be lazy. It even appealed to many emotions that many different people were feeling at the time, but I feel that it did it expertly. In fact, I was impressed with how he was able to capture such a wide range of emotions so accurately.

Again, I can think of many others where the list form is not effective.

The Brad Paisley got me thinking though.

I don’t think list songs, per se, are the problem. The problem is songwriting by committee. The product may be more professional, but the inspiration is largely lost

By the way - if you want great list songs, try Hank Snow’s recording of “I’ve Been Everywhere” or Dave Dudley’s recording of “Ain’t No Easy Runs”

I, too, am amazed at some songs that have four or five songwriters these days. If a song needs so many writers, it should be exceptionally good. Instead, those songs seem to be rather weak. To many hands in the pot?

Hey Charlie:
As usual, I agree with the substance of your post.
But can you try to edit the four letter words?

I know the guys who run this site try to keep the comments as open as possible. What that means to me is that I wouldn’t be embarrassed if my 15 year old came across something. I don’t want the site owners to feel like they have to approve comments. That would slow up the wonderful discussions we all have!

Trust me, I’m not a saint in the language department. But when writing on the web, its important to remember how wide the audience is.

Thanks.

PS-What was the name of that Tom Hanks movie where he was sitting on the bench talking about all of the things he did? I call that a list movie. Limited character development, just episodic bits and pieces. I never believed any of the movie.

The Top 40 mainstream country Muzak establishment has carved out a listening audience that absolutely adores “list” songs, so criticism on an artistic level although valid is largely irrelevant. The stuff targeted at Top 40 country radio has become merely a “product” designed by songwriters to fit certain parameters covered in the original post and the others in this blog. These listeners typically want to be touched in a shallow, sappy sentimental way, call it the “Hallmark syndrome”, so list songs strive to cover as many such listeners as possible. Its like shooting for the artistic lowest common denominator as a pragmatic approach to marketing this drivel to an appreciative audience.

Using lists is just one of the common features that have reduced the state of mainstream country music to its current sad state. Radio wants everything to sound basically the same so songwriters have no motivation to be inventive or original. Repacking the same old crap with a flashy new label is the road to success in today’s Top 40 country marketplace, so if songwriters want to earn royalties they know what they have to do.

PS - Sarah Buxton’s “That Kind of Day” was a delightfully creative list song, so I have no qualms if they are well executed….

I don’t think there is anything wrong with list songs, it seems to me like it just so happens that many list songs have shallow themes, and the lists don’t do anything to fix that. For example, Brad Paisley. Letter to me is a very good list song, but I’m still A Guy is very shallow. Compare the themes of the songs, and Letter to Me is much deeper, so the examples in the list support it rather than bring out the shallowness.

“list songs” are to contemporary pop-country music what canned beats are to contemporary pop-R&B music. It’s a cut and paste mentality to better insure hit creation. It’s not that it’s lazy (it is) it’s that when an industry puts costs containment and hedging risks over excellence you get conveyor belt product.

McDonald’s burgers are not the best but their cheap and you know what our going to get.

This may be a tad obscure for the top 40 fans out there, but Hayes Carll’s “Down the Road Tonight” isnt only a listing of the people, events and things he has come accross in his time in Austin, Houston and Nashville (Beans and Biscuits in my cupboardard/listen to Ray Wylie Hubbard), but it’s hilarious too. What other song proclaims that “My Grandmama’s name was Stella/Michael Jackson peaked at Thriller”????

Leeann had a comment above about the quantity of writers per track. I think it could be compared to when Hollywood studios get multiple writers doing drafts of blockbuster movie scripts and creating a flick which focus tests well, but lacks real soul and humanity. The publishers and writers have been conditioned to think “blockbuster” because that is what the labels are buying and what Country radio is playing.

At the same time, however, professional songwriters are highly prolific. Their work may be more varied, but if it never gets cut or released as a single, then it’s like the proverbial tree falling in the forest. I’m not opposed to anyone finding a formula for making a living out of making music, but it’s a bit disheartening to find out that, just like working a 9-5 job, a person can get pigeonholed into a certain role and not be allowed to show all of their talents due to organizational needs.

Or maybe I’ve just ventured into “talking out my ass” territory.