Country Update BILLBOARD.COM/NEWSLETTERS APRIL 20, 2020 | PAGE 1 OF 19 INSIDE BILLBOARD COUNTRY UPDATE [email protected] Barrett Finds ‘Hope’ At The Top Country Expands Style, Boundaries >page 5 With Increasing Pop Partnerships Recording Continues With Studios Closed Country is by definition a form of popular music, but the mod- On The Charts, page 5); Blake Shelton and pop/rock vocalist >page 11 ern version has popped up even more. Gwen Stefani rank No. 2 with “Nobody But You”; Brett Young, Artists from other genres are seemingly working with coun- who is at No. 3 with “Catch,” is simultaneously working “I Do,” try acts in greater numbers than ever, and a flurry of activity a tech-driven duet with European pop singer Astrid S; and Mor- surrounding the past weekend underscored the trend: gan Wallen, whose “Chasin’ You” is No. 4, already has snagged Country’s Happiest • Gabby Barrett unveiled an alternate version of “I Hope” a gold single from the RIAA for “Heartless,” which is featured Song Is… f e a t u r i n g p o p on that forthcom- >page 12 singer-songwriter- ing Diplo album. producer Charlie “My music is on Puth on April 17. the redneck side • E D M a r t i s t of things,” says Springsteen Born Diplo issued a col- Wallen, drawing a To Air In NYC laboration with comparison with >page 12 Blanco Brown, “Do the pop percussion Si Do,” on April 17 in “Heartless.” while announcing “But me and my Makin’ Tracks: the May 29 release buddies back home, Hambrick’s ‘Forever’ of a country-themed we listened to old- Soul album, Diplo Pres- s c h o o l c o u nt r y ents Thomas Wesley music, we listened >page 16 WALLEN LEGEND BALLERINI Chapter 1: Snake to old country/rock, Oil, featuring Cam, but sometimes Zac Brown, Danielle Bradbery and Thomas Rhett. we’ll turn on hip-hop. We don’t really think about it like, ‘Oh Country Coda: • Maren Morris and Hozier teamed on April 18 for an online man, you’re not country anymore.’ [A guy] about to go get on a A ‘Lesson’ From performance of “The Bones” during the Global Citizen One tractor, that dude’s definitely country.” Dottie West World: Together at Home concert special. The pop invasion is particularly evident in the current Acad- >page 19 • Kelsea Ballerini and Halsey officially asked for adds from emy of Country Music Awards storyline. Dan + Shay’s duet with country radio on April 20 for a new single, “the other girl.” Justin Bieber, “10,000 Hours,” appears in three categories on The trend is more intense atop the Country Airplay charts. the ballot, including music event of the year, where the com- The Puth collaboration enhances Barrett’s No. 1 single (see petition includes the 11-times-platinum “Old Town Road” by STREIBER/NBC ART BILLBOARD COUNTRY UPDATE APRIL 20, 2020 | PAGE 2 OF 19 Lil Nas X and Billy Ray Cyrus. When the coronavirus shutdown forced the chat with Barrett in conjunction with the new version of “I Hope.” “So this is postponement of the ACMs, CBS replaced it in the April 5 lineup with ACM an exciting thing, right? Because it’s diving into an area that I’ve never been Presents: Our Country, featuring the first live performance of a John Legend/ to before.” Kane Brown cowrite, “Last Time I Say Sorry,” a piece that blends country’s But country radio is often not the driver when its artists seek alliances out- lyrical approach with a pop-leaning chord structure. side the genre. Singles frequently take 35-40 weeks to complete their chart “I’ve never bought into segregating genres so run on Country Airplay. While those songs advance slowly, avid fans want rigidly,” says Legend. “Music is music. Music is more music from their favorite artists. They’re able to find it through other universal, and a lot of the things we talk about platforms, and those platforms are less concerned with idiomatic constraints. in our songs — love, loss, regret, jealousy — are “Streaming makes it so you can release these one-off collabs outside of an universal themes.” album, where it might not fit as well with the other album tracks,” says Leg- However, marketers have separated music into end. “Streaming frees up artists to experiment with different release timing, different silos, in part to help identify and clas- new combinations, etc. And streaming also gives our audience more freedom sify sonic textures. R&B fought an uphill battle to try new things.” against the mainstream for decades — contro- No matter where those collaborations find footing, that sense of newness versy swirled, for example, in the early ’80s when and experimentation they provide is likely to keep the new generation of coun- MTV initially paid little attention to massive hits try artists inspired. BROWN by Prince and Michael Jackson — and country “I never want to be put into any box,” says Brown. “I want to challenge my- has typically received short shrift thanks to early self and create music I like and that my fans will love. Good music is just good stereotypes of the genre as backward or hayseed. music, and I think my fans support that and think that, too.” Perceptions of country’s limitations have changed greatly in the 21st cen- tury, as documented in the 18-year-old CMT Crossroads series. Most of the series’ early pairings — such as Hank Williams Jr. and Kid Rock, Willie Nel- son and Sheryl Crow or Brooks & Dunn and ZZ Top — were easily explained. Some of the more recent editions — Chris Young and Gavin DeGraw, Luke Combs and Leon Bridges or Kacey Musgraves and Katy Perry — have been less obvious and frequently more satisfying. “Because the genre has expanded and is as big as it is right now, it has opened up a lot of doors to a lot of different artists and different genres that want to come in and do these [episodes] with our artists,” says CMT vp music and event production Margaret Comeaux. CMT is not the only network that has aided the shift in collaborations. The music contests — led by NBC’s The Voice and ABC’s American Idol — have provided country more primetime exposure than it has received in decades, and it has made it easier for the genre’s artists to find common ground with their non-country peers. Ballerini cowrote with a pop artist for the first time in the midst of production in Los Angeles on ABC’s 2016 summer series Greatest COMEAUX Hits. Legend and Brown, who already shared the same Lady Antebellum recorded “Champagne Night,” written by Madeline stylist, crossed paths when Brown was a guest on The Voice, where Legend Merlo, in conjunction with the April 13 season premiere of NBC’s is one of the coaches. Those cross-genre pairings enhance the marketing Songland. From left: Lady A’s Dave Haywood and Hillary Scott, opportunity that TV provides. Merlo, songwriter and Songland judge Shane McAnally and Lady A’s “One of the things collaborating does is it gives you exposure to fans who Charles Kelley. may not normally hear your music,” asserts Brown. “And it gives people not familiar with country music an idea of how wide and diverse the genre of country is and can be. It’s not just one thing.” Country traditionalists have historically tried to discourage their artists from these sorts of collaborations, though plenty of crossover pairings have worked in previous eras, including Willie Nelson and Julio Iglesias, Alabama and Lionel Richie, Kenny Rogers and Sheena Easton, and Earl Thomas Conley and Bonnie Pointer. Ballerini and Brown have both felt the sting of hardcore dissent, though it’s not nearly as prominent as it once was. In fact, media strategist Mark Ramsey unveiled a study during the Country Radio Seminar in February indicating that while country programmers believe their listeners want fewer cross-genre collaborations, the fans themselves actually would like to hear more. Program directors, it seems, expected pushback from fans when Bebe Rexha or Backstreet Boys showed up on their stations. But the fact that they were accompanied by Florida Georgia Line made it OK. “The presence of country artists legitimizes the presence of other artists,” surmised Ramsey. Additionally, those pop appearances are helping the format maintain always- valued variety. “Right now, country radio is really trending very country — like, you’re hearing more throwback ’90s-sounding country right now,” says Ballerini. “It’s those big pop collaborations that are breaking up that trend a little bit.” Scotty McCreery will become the first country artist to deliver a virtual For the pop artists, it’s an intriguing way to expand their audiences. concert in the gaming world when his avatar (shown center stage) “I’ve never been on country radio,” said Puth during an Amazon Live appears on the Club Cooee social network April 24-26 and May 1-3. TKB CREDIT BILLBOARD COUNTRY UPDATE APRIL 120,3, 2020 | PAGE 45 OF 19 ON THETHE CHARTSCHARTS JIMJIM ASKERASKER [email protected] [email protected] SamHGabbyunt’s Southside Barrett’s R‘Iules Hope’ Top Tops Countr y Albums;Country Airplay Brett Young ‘Catc As Womenh’-es Fifth Hit Airplay A Lea24-Year Highder; Travis OnDenning Hot Country Makes History Songs SamGabby Hunt Barrett’s second’s debut studio hit, “I full-length, Hope” (Warner and first Music in Nashville/WAR),over five years, Southside ascends salesto 34.9 (up million 21%) in in the radio tracking reach week.