The greatest country album ever… not.
Alot of people are obsessed with Beyonce. They call her Queen Bee. They worship at her altar. Beyonce can do no wrong in their eyes. They say she’s the greatest pop performer of all time, ignoring, or certainly downplaying, Michael Jackson, Prince, Bob Marley, John Lennon, Bruce Springsteen, Marvin Gaye, Brian Wilson and many others.
But the canon of music is bigger and deeper than the last couple decades of pop music, those of us who are older and true music aficionados know.
Now Beyonce has put out a “country” album, and people who should be more responsible, such as news reporters and cultural commentators, are wildly calling Beyonce’s “Cowboy Carter” the “greatest country album of all time.” Some seem to believe because Beyonce put out a country album, it must be the greatest country album ever.
It’s not.
I like Beyonce’s music. I think she’s a fine pop and R&B singer, with lots of range and soul, and she’s a good songwriter… although she usually collaborates with other songwriters on her compositions.
Listening to the “Cowboy Carter” album, it’s easy to conclude that it’s not the greatest country album of all time, largely because much of it isn’t country. Much of it is pop, hip-hop and R&B with a country tinge, mixed with some rollicking gospel.
I like “Cowboy Carter,” though. Most of it’s good. Some of it is better than good.
Is it much of it better than the horrid, pandering, simplistic shlock that passes for country music on commercial country radio nowadays? Most of that stuff is godawful, and much of “Cowboy Carter” is much better than that, because it, at least, is daring and not the crassly commercial brainless crap almost exclusively played on country stations these days.
Is it better than the best singles and albums of all-time country greats Patsy Cline, Merle Haggard, George Jones, Steve Earle, Buck Owens, Charlie
Pride, Townes Van Zandt and Lucinda Williams? Absolutely not.
People are making a big deal about Beyonce breaking barriers and going into a musical genre where African-American women have rarely gone. But Rhiannon Giddens, another stunningly beautiful African-American woman, has been doing albums that have some of the same feel of “Cowboy Carter” for years. Giddens’ albums are better, though, and I would argue Giddens is a more powerful singer than Beyonce. And the truth is there have been more than a few other Black women involved in country music. Beyonce honors Linda Martell, one such woman, on the album, which is a nice touch.
Let’s face it. All music is derivative. All music has elements borrowed from musical predecessors. That’s how music works.
“Cowboy Carter,” though, is a bit too derivative. Beyonce overtly borrows from Giddens and Dolly Parton – Parton appears on the album, and Beyonce sings the Parton classic “Jolene” -through much of “Cowboy Carter,” and she also borrows from Aretha Franklin, although Beyonce has borrowed from Aretha throughout her career.
What is great music, a great film, a great piece of art is all subjective, of course. “Cowboy Carter,” in my subjective opinion, is a fine album. The best music takes its influences and moves a musical genre forward. And “Cowboy Carter” moves country music forward in that it opens the genre to new sounds… and new listeners.
Does “Cowboy Carter,” though, have the poetry, pain, angst and incredible country music hooks of the best work of, say, country music genius Merle Haggard? (And if you are thinking right now, “Who’s Merle Haggard,” you’re making my point.) No, it doesn’t.
“Cowboy Carter” is an artistic triumph overall, and some fine fun, but really, it’s not even close to some really good Merle.