LORETTA & HER DAUGHTERS

When I'm 70, can I have a hip, 30-year-old wunderkind adore me? And by that time will I have built up the tolerance to drink sloe gin fizz by the pitcher? —Danielle Dreilinger (WBUR-FM, Nashville Scene)

While I was interviewing Loretta Lynn in the summer of 2003, I asked why you didn't hear the topics that had helped make her famous—lying, cheating and drinking—in country songs anymore. "You won't remember those songs either, will you?" she quickly replied. "They don't stay with you." Lynn was right, of course. Too much mainstream country music in 2004 sounded as if they'd been cribbed from a Lifetime television movie, and their hook-challenged melodies frequently proved hard to hold on to. I heard "Live Like You Were Dying" and "Me and Emily" dozens, if not hundreds, of times last year, but I still don't think I could hum or whistle either one all the way through. By contrast, Lynn's amazing "Miss Being Mrs." and "Portland, Oregon" are still ringing in my head. Both, alas, were neglected by country radio and the CMA awards. —Greg Crawford (Detroit Free Press)

Neko Case has more Loretta Lynn in her than Lynn does these days. Admittedly Van Lear Rose was a good record, but hardly a Top Ten effort; its inevitable showing in nine out of 10 critics' Top Tens is more reactionary—another one of those quasi-sympathy votes we periodically extend to the pioneers of yore who mount comebacks—than a measured response to qualitative concerns. —Fred Mills (Magnet, Harp)

It's been heartening to watch Alison Krauss evolve over the past decade from a goofball tomboy fiddle prodigy to a goofball glamourpuss fiddle prodigy without dumping her band or adulterating her approach in any substantial way. I mean, she even still records for Rounder—how righteous is that? And on top of it all, she has the most sublime voice in all country music. Keep it real, kid. —Will Hermes (Spin, Tracks)

MUZIK MAFIA

With due respect to Dame Loretta Lynn, Big & Rich were the country music story of 2004, even if their colleague Gretchen Wilson made the better record. They were to mainstream country what Kanye West was to mainstream hip-hop—insiders with an impressive track record and a subversive streak wide as a middle-American behind. Sure, their circus of Russian-rhyming rappers and vertically-challenged hype men bore a whiff of elephant poop. But like P.T. Barnum, they know how to put on a show. —Will Hermes (Spin, Tracks)

A major problem with country music in 2004 was that it existed in a vacuum. For those of us who've been listening to, say, George Clinton for years, Big & Rich's marriage of country and something else that might be described as funky is just no big deal. But for listeners who have attended to country music and mainstream pop to the exclusion of nearly everything else, it's obviously a way out of country and into something else, ill-defined as that might be. There are many other ways out. —Edd S. Hurt (Village Voice)

Let's begin with the obvious thing, which is that Gretchen Wilson was no more a rebel this past year than Toby or Gentry or even friggin' Dierks Bentley. But the fact that the hornswoggle was successful says loads about Music Row's increasing insularity. At times, Nashville seems like the military, or any big corporation for that matter—ideas born of frustration, cooked in the cauldron of resentment, become part of the larger scheme, and while those who get let in the big house pat each other on the back and wipe the sweat from their brows, their new bosses are busy patching up the holes. No matter how tight and sequined John Rich's pants are, he poses less of a threat today than he did 12 months ago. —Jon Caramanica (Rolling Stone, Village Voice)

Like the one better ("Homewrecker") and eight worse songs on the album, "Redneck Woman" is standard-issue grease for Music City's cogs. The principals are well-above-par hacks with a little irony, and there's honor in that, and pleasure. But let's not mishear the record just because Ms. Wilson and her cronies preach universal love (so does Usher!) and roll with a lame, albeit African American, rapper. As a social claim, "Redneck Woman" is humbled before "Coal Miner's Daughter"; musically, the Muzik Mafia are far more conservative than, say, Montgomery Gentry or even Patty Loveless. The weird thing was how yearningly the critics fantasized it was some kind of exception, some new direction, some rebellion or paradigm shift; if they liked it, it must not be business as usual. Dudes, it's a very good, standard-issue country single. Why can't we just recognize it for what it is? —Joshua Clover (Village Voice, New York Times)

I still remember the first time I heard Gretchen Wilson's "Redneck Woman" on KZLA out here in Los Angeles. I hadn't read or heard one single thing about her or the Muzik Mafia; I didn't even know who was singing the song as it played. I just sat there in the car and listened to it, taken with its evocation of "Skynyrd, Kid and Strait"—a fusion of Southern rock, hip-hop and traditional country that I was accustomed to experiencing in L.A. clubs but which I didn't expect to hear on mainstream radio. I started singing along. I still grimace every time I hear that #♦ it's an honest reflection of a very real and widespread working-class mentality. It's been too long since country music has done that. —Bliss Bowen (Pasadena Weekly, Fade In)

ELECTION YEAR

I don't think you can write about 2004 without mentioning the impact or lack thereof of music and artists on the election. Out here in the middle of the red states, country was the political music of choice and Toby Keith, Daryl Worley, etc. were the artists of choice. Steve Earle's The Revolution Starts...Now came and went without making much of a stir and, despite all the publicity, the much ballyhooed Vote for Change concerts didn't stir a lot of interest either. Perhaps the lesson is that in a time of media saturation, there's little any celebrity voice on any side can do to influence an election—there's just too much other opinion out there for it to matter. —L. Kent Wolgamott (Lincoln Journal Star)

Maybe I'd be more sympathetic if it seemed like the only country artists speaking out against the war weren't on New West, Artemis, Bloodshot or Yep Roc. For all the alleged formal rejiggering the Nashville sound underwent this year, the party line remained mostly unchanged. Ronnie & Kix held it down at Madison Square Garden in August; Montgomery Gentry issued a video that espoused libertarianism (which looks a lot like vigilantism); noble Gary Allan got co-opted, and even Darryl Worley pulled a fast one, sneaking a quick Iraq lament onto an otherwise competent, even strong album that, if he had more confidence, could have set him up to play somewhere other than VFW halls 20 years hence. —Jon Caramanica (Rolling Stone, Village Voice)

For daring to review Buddy Miller's Universal United Church of Prayer in the context of it being a pointed, anti-Bush administration protest record, I got canned by a right-leaning editor who determined that the arts section of his newspaper was no place for op-ed pieces. Well, fuck him and all the Bush supporters he rode in with, because this is a protest album, its sentiments filtered through Miller's Christian faith. Recall that gospel music was the soundtrack to the early civil rights movement and it rings true alongside the most politically-charged albums of 2004. As Miller himself told one interviewer, "I am trying to make a point. It's an important time to be thinking right now." —Fred Mills (Magnet, Harp)

Thank you to Buddy Miller, for making a record that helped redeem U.S. Christianity and country music in a year when both seemed largely indifferent (at best) to our government's shameless conduct at home and around the world. —Will Hermes (Spin, Tracks)

THE FUTURE OF COUNTRY MUSIC

One trend is that gospel music seems to be slowly worming its way into the secular field. You could hear it in Kanye West and U2, and you could especially hear it in country music, but it wasn't all worship and praise. Josh Turner's darkly cautionary "Long Black Train" sounded like something that would have been written in the Great Depression. Buddy Miller cut an all-gospel album but sprinkled it with troubled thoughts, prayers for redemption and anti-war protests. Mindy Smith's "Come to Jesus" sounded like a last-ditch plea from someone who'd already been burned by the fires of hell. And on "Monday Morning Church," Alan Jackson sounds like he's ready to toss the family Bible in the flames and join his wife in the grave. —Ron Warnick (Sauk Valley Newspapers)

WHAT COLOR IS COUNTRY MUSIC?

U.S. music and Mexican music have been mixing DNA for centuries. Mexico is officially in country's view a place to vacation and a place to run to, but truly its music is part of the bones and structure of country music as well. My thought here is that the incorporation of horns and other Mexican stylings into country, if it takes place, will be a lot less fraught than the incorporation of rap, for instance. And country could learn a lot from Mexican and Latin music in general about how to take in other sounds, including hip-hop, reggae and the like, while keeping a sense of ease about it and not losing one's sense of musical self. —Frank Kogan (Village Voice)

Two of the year's best alternative-country albums came from Latino American singer-songwriters who blended their south-of-the-border rhythms and Roman Catholic faith with their Velvet Underground grittiness and skeptical realism. Cuban American Walter Salas-Humara, who led The Silos on When the Telephone Rings, and Mexican American Jon Dee Graham, who released the solo disc The Great Battle, demonstrated just how much country music has to gain by looking south. Not coincidentally, both are ex-bandmates of Alejandro Escovedo. —Geoffrey Himes (Washington Post, Baltimore City Paper, Nashville Scene)

As the great Charlie Parker once said to his bop comrades that ridiculed his love of country (retold in a Nat Hentoff book), "Listen to the stories." That's how I've always considered what is or isn't country. Perhaps the biggest failing of the country industry continues to be its inability (refusal?) to do more outreach to the black and Latino communities. These are both a source of more listeners and an untapped talent base, because there are many singers in both camps who treasure and perform country music, and frequently look to country songwriters for ideas. More importantly, country's historic links to black and Latin music have been chronicled in numerous histories. It's disgraceful that in 2005 there aren't more Charley Prides and Freddy Fenders. —Ron Wynn (Nashville City Paper, Jazz Times)

I found it interesting that Toby Keith had a hit with "Stays in Mexico" and that Montgomery Gentry did a song where they said that they don't know anything about Mexico. Those old boys better learn something quick-like, because they're missing a revolution. Norteño acts like Los Tigres del Norte and Los Tucanes de Tijuana released monster albums that sounded way more "country" than most of the stuff on the radio. Everyone who is bemoaning the loss of "classic country music" should find their way to a Wal-Mart and watch all the cowboy-hatted blue-collar Mexican-Americans picking up accordion-based two-step music of great skill and depth of feeling. If some artificial language barrier is the only reason keeping you from hearing Polo Urias or Intocable or Beto y Sus Canarios or Monchy & Alexander, please step aside and let America pass you right by. —Matt Cibula (popMatters.com, stylusmagazine.com)

ALTERNATIVE COUNTRY

The country album that sounded best to me this year was Allison Moorer walking away from everything: Nashville (the dirty '70s-rock sound), blind patriotism ("All Aboard," a condemnation of our rush to war), God (the title track, "Believe You Me," which is probably just as much about America as it is about God), hope itself. It was a Spectacular Bridge-Burning Performance of Incredible Bravery...and, like most SBBPIBs, it didn't sell a lot of copies. Similarly, Charlie Robison didn't get very far on the charts, even though his record contained at least two cross-dressing songs, sex and drug references, and a hearty screw-you attitude toward the machine. Hey, the machine doesn't run right if it ain't flipped off regularly! In a year when most people seemed to want to slip right in, I loved the songs that came from these two intelligent compassionate angry people saying "Hell Naw!" in thunder. —Matt Cibula (popMatters.com, stylusmagazine.com)

The year 2004 showed that recessions in country music can be good things. Record companies are more apt to take chances during hard times than stick to safe formulas that worked well in the gravy-boat '90s. That's why a slightly trashy 30-something woman took Nashville by storm. That's why a duo that mixes rock, rap and country as if consultants didn't exist became stars. That's why a 69-year-old icon collaborated with a garage-rocker to make the best album of her career. However, the best country artist may be a band that doesn't even work the genre. The Drive-By Truckers have released three outstanding rock albums—Southern Rock Opera, Decoration Day and now The Dirty South—in less than four years. Their highly detailed stories about the realities and myths of the South show they have their fingers on the pulse of country audiences. —Ron Warnick (Sauk Valley Newspapers)

If the Drive-By Truckers and Steve Earle sound too little like Hank Sr. to be considered country, how can you apply the country label to the equally un-Hank-like sound of Keith Urban, Tim McGraw or Kenny Chesney? Either they're all in or none should be in. The only possible justification for putting Urban and Chesney in the country camp but leaving the Truckers and Earle out is to say that such definitions are out of our hands and can only be made by the program directors at major country-radio stations. Even if we were willing to abdicate our responsibilities, why would we hand them over to people who care less about finding the best country songs than finding inoffensive songs that won't cause listeners to turn the dial away from a station's advertisers? —Geoffrey Himes (Washington Post, Baltimore City Paper, Nashville Scene)

WHAT IS COUNTRY MUSIC?

As a Southerner born and raised in a blue-collar family from a small North Carolina textile town, I found Alan Jackson's "The Talkin' Song Repair Blues," from What I Do, speaking to the frustrations of living on a budget and having to put out $800 for a repair bill on some old clunker. Jackson's expertise in expressing this frustration through music that's as familiar to me as the sight of a rusted hosiery mill at the side of a winding country road brings it all back home. But so does Jon Langford's sympathetic British view of America's struggle with blind patriotism and the false hope of greedy capitalism in "Constanz," the honky-tonk lead-off track on All the Fame of Lofty Deeds: "The country is not stupid / Even though it's silent / It still has eyes and ears / It just can't find its mouth." —Mark Kemp (Charlotte Observer, Rolling Stone, Relix)

Several artists on my list do not necessarily conform to the conventions of either traditional or contemporary country. They might be more typically labeled as pop or rock or blues. But I would maintain that the albums on my Top Ten are far more aesthetically true to an authentic country sensibility than all but a handful of recent acts to squeeze through the narrow keyhole on to country radio. Ray Charles built his whole career on this fundamental truth, that the feeling transcends the form. Like Brother Ray, Norah Jones and Dave Alvin are building bridges between country and jazz, and country and blues, respectively. Meanwhile, Steve Earle and the Drive By Truckers rock with an anarchist hillbilly vengeance that puts the lie to the pseudo-populism of so much contemporary country and rock. —Rick Mitchell (Co-author of The True History of Texas Honky Tonk)

Lee Ann Womack's "I May Hate Myself in the Morning (But I'm Gonna Love You Tonight)" may seem, from a distance, like a traditionally fatalistic, wages-of-sin cheatin' song. But really it's more of a fornicatin' twist on "I Hope You Dance," more about what she hopes will happen, in the very near future, than about tomorrow's done deal. And young Julie Roberts, well, kids say the darndest things. She's already picked up "a stranger, found comfort in danger, and I thought about you, the whole time we were GETTINITONN." What a mouth! Speaking of which, "it tastes like yesterday." —Don Allred (Village Voice, freelance mentalist)

Blues made a welcome return to country this year—not in undiluted form, but in Roberts' warmth, style and phrasing. She's a tremendous ballad singer. Jess Brown and Patrick Jason Matthews' "Break Down Here" is a powerful song as written, but she puts it over the top with an aching sense of desperation that communicates a barely repressed passion without descending into bathos. —Bliss Bowen (Pasadena Weekly, Fade In)

I'm less concerned with what's country than with what's good. Though if Shania Twain's a country artist and Buddy Miller isn't, the term is meaningless. —Don McLeese (No Depression)