Modern Sounds vs. Traditional Country: Zac Brown, Gary Allan and Eric Church Sound Off [POLL]

I'm sure you heard the controversial statements made by Zac Brown of the Zac Brown Band the other day. He had some harsh words for a big country hit right now, and for a few other trends going on in the charts. During an interview with a radio station, the topic turned to some of the current country hit songs, Luke Bryan's "My Kind of Night" in particular.

Here's what Zac said.

“To me, country music has always been the home for a great song.  If I hear one more tailgate in the moonlight, daisy duke song, I’m gonna throw up.  I love Luke Bryan and he’s had some great songs, but this new song is the worst song I’ve ever heard.  I know Luke, he’s a friend. ‘[That's] My Kinda Night’ is one of the worst songs I’ve ever heard. I see it being commercially successful in what is called country music these days, but I also feel like that the people deserve something better than that.

And just the other day, Gary Allan appeared on the new Larry King show, and spoke out about a similar type of topic, but without naming any names or songs in particular.

You used to be able to turn on the radio and you knew instantly it was a country station, just by listening to it. And now you’ve got to leave it there for a second to figure it out.

Meanwhile, another icon of music, Tom Petty, weighed in recently, too.

I don’t really see a George Jones or a Buck Owens or any anything that fresh coming up.  I’m sure there must be somebody doing it, but most of that music reminds me of rock in the middle 80s where it became incredibly generic and relied on videos.

So far, the main defender of these comments has been Eric Church.

I think at any point of time, any music, there’s always stuff that’s good; there’s always stuff that’s bad.  I think you can go back to Cash and Waylon’s time and even after that — there was stuff that wasn’t great. So, I think a lot of of it is — does it have a chance to succeed? Does cool stuff have a chance to get out there?”

 

He's got a point there. But, he doesn't really say anything that contradicts Gary or Zac, either. He admits there is good and bad music out there.

So what do you think? Do you think country should expand what they talk about? Should they go back to a more country sound? Do you like the hip hop/pop experiments in country? Take our poll below and tell us what you think in the comments.