Country Update
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Country Update BILLBOARD.COM/NEWSLETTERS MARCH 4, 2019 | PAGE 1 OF 18 INSIDE BILLBOARD COUNTRY UPDATE [email protected] Modern Lessons In Fresh From Her Grammy Triumph, Country & Western >page 2 Kacey Musgraves Is ‘Golden’ At The Ryman Luke Combs High-Fives Three songs into her March 2 set at Nashville’s Ryman The singular result of her willful efforts was on full display The Charts Auditorium, Kacey Musgraves casually encouraged a sold- in the concert, the last of four straight sell-outs at the Ryman. >page 4 out audience to “put your middle fingers up in the air.” The songs veered from Western-influenced country to neo-disco It was a grunge-rock move that led into a melancholy love with sometimes incongruous instrumentation — who else uses song, “Butterflies,” and one that underscores the complexity a steel guitar and bowed cello in the same arrangement? The that helped Musgraves and her Golden Hour project win four mashup of country and almost everything else conjured a whole WIVK, KNIX A-O.K. Grammy Awards — including the overall pageant of possible influences: Marty Robbins, With ACMs album of the year, rare for a country artist Fleetwood Mac, Joan Baez and even space- >page 8 — just three weeks prior. Musgraves is age-bachelor-pad-music guy Esquivel. simultaneously daring and harmless, a chill But the most consistent influence seemed to rebel in the mold of Willie Nelson, making be Brian Wilson, the ultimate master of subtle Thomas Rhett Sets music and social statements without caring melody. Musgraves’ songs almost always use New Album if everyone inhales. at least one unexpected turn — an odd rhyme Seven years ago in that very same hall, scheme, a surprise chord or a left-field melodic >page 9 Country Radio Seminar attendees had risen twist — and the result is a body of smart material in adulation when she performed “Merry with sophisticated sounds, making her the kind Go ’Round,” a song that programmers of artist who simultaneously defies and elevates vaulted into the top 10 on Country Airplay notions of genre. Makin’ Tracks: MUSGRAVES Matt Stell’s the following year. Just weeks ago, a For all the hoopla about her lack of radio ‘Prayed For You’ programmer pondered during the 2019 support, Musgraves had the crowd audibly >page 13 version of that same convention if maybe country radio had singing the songs verbatim, demonstrating that she has — like missed out on Golden Hour. a card-carrying Texas artist — found an exuberant audience In truth, what programmers had missed is the recognition without the traditional terrestrial vehicle. “Rainbow,” which that Musgraves is, at heart, a card-carrying Texas artist, one who had a bit of a Carole King feel-good air about it near the end of Country Coda: follows her own arrow come hell or high water. That’s an approach her show, may change her relationship with the radio platform. Sonny James, taken by fellow Texans George Strait, Miranda Lambert, Cody It’s currently at No. 41 on Country Airplay. The 1 And ‘Only’ Johnson and Maren Morris, who occupied a seat in the balcony But if it does, that success will come — like it did for Nelson >page 18 at the March 2 show. Musgraves trusts her creative muse and — by charting her own course and not bending to prescribed seems intent on not pointing her arrow at any box that might rules. Her best middle finger isn’t a real digit. It’s just a guitar require her to compromise her individuality. and a pen and a dogged refusal to conform. NELSON JAMIE 57 FIRST WEEK STATIONS R E D N E C K E R THANK YOU COUNTRY RADIO! BILLBOARD COUNTRY UPDATE MARCH 4, 2019 | PAGE 2 OF 18 Modern Lessons In Country And Western Jimmie Allen, Darius Rucker and Kane Brown are making a statement in contemporary country by tearing down the historical belief that the genre is closed to people of color. But the advances the music has made at eliminating racial stereotypes on the creative end are only half the battle, according to a Grammy-winning artist- producer, who believes that the country business could widen its reach by making black fans feel more welcome. Garth Brooks and Old Crow Medicine Show helped recognize Opry “The biggest mistake in the country music industry is not marketing to black Entertainment senior vp programming and artist relations Sally people,” said Shannon Sanders, musical director for The Fisk Jubilee Singers’ Williams as the Nashville Honors Gala raised $500,000 for the T.J. performance on Rodney Atkins’ “Caught Up in the Country,” during a panel Martell Foundation on Feb. 25. From left: Old Crow’s Critter Fuqua and at the Country Music Hall of Fame celebrating Ray Charles’ Modern Sounds Ketch Secor, Williams and Brooks. in Country and Western Music. “You have no idea how many black folks really love country music, but we don’t feel like part of the conversation because we can’t find the front door.” Indeed, a 2016 study issued by the Country Music Association indicated that 71 percent of non-whites listen to country on a weekly basis, a figure that exactly mirrored the percentage of Caucasians who listen. If that figure is correct, then the volume of African-Americans at such concerts should approximate the percentage of blacks in the overall population. It does not — blacks make up 13 percent of the population, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, and no one eyeballing most country concert venues would argue that even 10 percent of those audiences is black. America’s historic racial problems are no doubt at play. Segregation banned blacks from occupying the same spaces as whites in many cities into the 1960s, and even after courts determined that such laws are unconstitutional, Trisha Yearwood visited Cumulus’ Nash campus on March 1 to neighborhoods were slow to integrate. discuss her album of traditional pop standards, Let’s Be Frank, on the Charles bucked rules in some communities by refusing to perform at syndicated morning program The Ty Bentli Show. From left: Bentli, segregated venues, and the Modern Sounds albums appropriately integrated Yearwood, Tricia “T.J.” Jenkins and Chuck Wicks. multiple musical ideals like big-band arrangements, adult-pop background vocals and a soul vocal lead over country standards. Both volumes have been out of print in recent years, though Concord Music rereleased them on Feb. 22 with the same cross-cultural goal that Sanders espoused. “The social statement that he makes with these records is so relevant right now,” said Concord president John Burk. “He broke down every musical barrier in one album and at the same time made a huge statement about unity through music and bringing it all together.” Sanders remembered his first country session, when he feared he would be shunned or mistreated by the other musicians. He was not. “You realize it’s just a conversation,” he said. “When we all get in a studio New artist Darby, 16, paid a visit to the Billboard offices in Nashville and sing together, play together, you realize how much you have in common, on Feb. 27. From left: Billboard country correspondent Annie Reuter, and then those boundaries come down.” Darby and producer Justin Ebach. IMAGES. GETTY DAVIS JASON BROOKS: BILLBOARD COUNTRY UPDATE MARCH 4, 2019 | PAGE 4 OF 18 ON THE CHARTS JIM ASKER [email protected] Combs’ Quintuplet: He Becomes The Second Artist To Simultaneously Lead All Five Country Charts For only the second time, a single artist rules all five of Billboard’s main to the summit for a 27th week on the new March 9 tally, ascending 2-1 with country charts at once: Luke Combs rules Top Country Albums, Hot Country 25,000 equivalent album units (down 1 percent) in the week ending Feb. 28. Songs, Country Airplay, Country Streaming Songs and Country Digital Song The album dethrones Florida Georgia Line’s Can’t Say I Ain’t Country (Big Sales (all dated March 9). Machine Label Group), which dips to No. 2 Kane Brown first achieved such a (22,000 units, down 56 percent). The LP quintuple coronation in 2017. became FGL’s fourth Top Country Albums “This is a great day,” says Combs. “From leader and third to start at the pinnacle when being chosen as one of Billboard’s artists it arrived atop the March 2-dated chart with to watch in 2017 to now topping all five 50,000 units. charts is very humbling. This doesn’t Combs and Brown are now the only happen unless radio and the fans embrace artists to pull off such a sweep. Notably, both the music and me as much as they have. acts record for Sony Music Nashville. Brown That is the best part: that I get to wake first achieved the feat by simultaneously up every day and do this. I appreciate topping the tallies dated Oct. 28, 2017. That everyone supporting me and the music.” week, “What Ifs,” featuring Lauren Alaina, Combs’ “Beautiful Crazy” (River controlled Hot Country Songs, Country House/Columbia Nashville/Sony Music Airplay and Country Streaming Songs; Nashville) tops all four country song “Heaven” arrived atop Country Digital charts for a second straight week. The Song Sales; and his self-titled debut LP led ballad (which he co-wrote with Wyatt Top Country Albums. Durrette and Robert Williford) paces The chart achievements keep rolling the airplay-, streaming- and sales- in for the 29-year-old Combs. On the powered Hot Country Songs chart for a March 2-dated Country Airplay list, “Crazy” second week.