I am sorry but ‘Donny and Marie’ have no place in this conversation.
I’d slightly disagree with some of the history here in that I think Country and Blues evolved out of original folk music of the 1850s - 1890s or so. Having split off, largely along racial lines, they then started to trade back and forth until the two had enough in common that rock and roll could evolve out of the combination of the two.
On a technical edge I’d offer these traits that distinguish a lot of country from rock.
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A brighter line between songwriter/performance. Country has a wider acceptance of artists performing songs written by professional songwriters.
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Drums. Country will have a lighter drum sound, sometimes almost lost in the background. In addition, country will more often have an emphasis on 1 and 3 as opposed to 2 and 4.
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Vocals. Country vocals tend to be more raw and have fewer effects than rock vocals, especially a lesser incidence of echo on the lead to add depth to a voice.
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Age. Country is, by far, less of a young persons game than rock. It’s more likely that a country performer can break while in their 30s than a rock performer.
This may be a more recent development, though, or the studios have just gotten more subtle about it. Go back and listen to some early George Strait (around 1979-1982). He’s swimming in echo and reverb. His newer stuff? Almost none, as far as I can tell. Of course, that may simply be reflecting his years of experience and the fact that his voice is much more mature and developed now. I’m just using him as an example because he’s the only currently popular country singer I can think of who’s been at it that long (almost 30 years since his first record!)
True dat. Trace Adkins was 35 when he got his first record deal, and he’s hitting his peak in popularity after age 40.
when country can come out with stuff like sgt pepper, the wall, the jericho tree, and such… there will will be no difference… until then,
rock is an art form… country is a commercial medium designed to sell crap to stupid people…
regards
FML
Hey, so do I. My main thing these days is country blues (ragtime/Piedmont, Delta, songster, east Texas, etc.), and various old-timey country/folk/jazz subgenres. Sounds like we’re kindred spirits.
That’s precisely what I’m talking about. Great story.
You win the fatuous post of the day award. Congratulations.
In the 70s, there was a brief vogue of putting steel guitar into rock songs. I think it was a reaction against the sitars and synthesizers of the 60s. But the dividing line does seem to be “twang.”
Beyond that, to paraphrase Bobcat Goldthwait, I’m pretty sure rock has more dark meat.
“The Jericho Tree”? Does U2 change the name of its albums for Canadian audiences?
The presence of a cowboy hat is usually a “tell”
Nitpick:
Country music is almost exclusively an American art form (Australian Keith Urban being a notable exception), so themes about the USA abound. There is some overlap between “themes about the USA” and patriotism, but they’re not identical. And any rock band singing about their own country, even and especially criticizing it, is exercising a form of patriotism.
When I saw Pantera at Ozfest, the lead singer was wearing a Cowboy hat.
Of course, Pantera was some pretty southern metal, so that was no surprise.
Cowboys from Hell, IIRC. Have you heard Hell Yeah yet? I’m curious
No. It was, and still is, known as The Joshua Tree up here.
I have a related anecdote about this. When I worked at the now-defunct A&A Records in Toronto, we got in an LP by Bowser & Blue. The front was an editorial-cartoon-style drawing of them. One was pictured in a cowboy hat. So it got filed in the country section. We never sold a single copy to the public, and they were eventually returned, all but one copy that a co-worker friend of mine picked up on a whim. As it turns out, it was a comedy record, full of parodies and funny songs, and was really quite good. Without support or direction from the label, and no one in store management interested in finding out how to market it, it died a miserable death in the wrong department. It wouldn’t surprise me if B&B ended up owing money on that one.