miranda lambert

I know during peak Covid, Isbell (who iirc donated the money made from Wallen's cover of his song to the NAACP) alluded to the countless closet covid deniers and reactionaries in Nashville. As well as the closet covid-cautious, afraid to out themselves to their conservative peers. I'm sure there is a similar don't ask/don't tell divide among many other issues and country artists, consistently outspoken asshats like Jason Aldean and John Rich aside.

I mean of course Nashville’s full of racists and right-wingers, it always has been. If anything it’s notable that there’s at least some space there for contrary voices like Maren Morris (and Taylor Swift!) but they’re obviously a minority in the industry.

also should be noted that nashville is not much different than any other sector of the music industry in terms of working w/ the once cancelled

the grammys just named a lifetime achievement award after dr. dre

Loretta Lynn's support of Trump

marissa r. moss on that:

She sang about the pill but didn’t take it herself. She performed for Richard Nixon but also became friends with Jimmy Carter (and supported Donald Trump in her later years). Some called her the liberal side of country for writing songs about contraception, while others saw her as emblematic of conservative stereotypes in her floor-length gowns and as a young mother of multiple children. Neither was exactly true: It is easy to simplify all this into contradictions, but it was only a contradiction if you thought you knew and understood women, specifically rural, Appalachian, or southern women. Lynn was complex, not a contradiction. And so are the women who love and are inspired by her songs.

didn't morgan wallen apologize? or has he doubled down / continued to say the n-word?

not my place to really tell anyone what to think about her working with wallen but there’s probably a more nuanced response to her working with a musician that lil durk says is a-ok than calling her pistol klannie and suggesting their collaboration is gonna be a racist song. I’m not saying Wallen is cool or anything, just it’s the type of response that isn’t gonna make Miranda pause and think things over. I realize I’m flailing against the Twitter dunking-on industrial complex of course.

Both tweets seem like good marketing, tbh

It's probably not hurting Adia Victoria's brand, but also as a Black artist in Nashville I'm sure her frustrations are real.

Yeah I’m sure it’s quite real, and idk maybe there’s something to Miranda’s politics that we don’t know about that is an open secret in country music. though iirc her Annies cohort angaleena presley is a bit on the left, so it’s hard to really say how much of a chud she could be.

didn't morgan wallen apologize? or has he doubled down / continued to say the n-word?

― c u (crüt), Tuesday, February 28, 2023 5:48 PM (fifty-nine minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

In April 2021, following the surge in album sales, Wallen donated $300,000 to the Black Music Action Coalition in the names of 20 people who had counseled him following the incident. Those individuals were given the option to funnel their respective $15,000 donations to a charity of their choice, or keep the money within the BMAC.[78] On July 23, 2021, Wallen publicly spoke of his comments on Good Morning America, where he said that "he was around some of his friends, and they say dumb stuff together" and said that "he was wrong" to express those words.

I should say as someone who's probably one of ILM's earliest supporters of Lambert -- whom I consider my favorite popular performer -- this doesn't shock me. What disappoints is she doesn't need him. So the alternative is she likes his voice and songs on 2023.

Her attitude and songwriting depends on an establishment against which she rebels, mind, so by implication she needs that Wallen establishment

her music might be leagues better, but I'm not sure what makes her less "establishment" than Warren at this point tbh

I think of this like pro athletes. Pro athletes don't really care if another guy is a locker room cancer, accused of domestic violence, a well-known diva, or busted doing 115 mph with a loaded gun in his car. Those guys only care about what you can do on the court/field, and if you can help them and/or the team.

This feels like that to me. She doesn't really care that much about a shitty thing Morgan Wallen did 2 years ago. As Alfred said, she probably likes his songs and his massive audience, and that's really all she's thinking about.

Par for the course to hold your nose and write with assholes in Nashville, I would guess.

"I only see one color ... green."

You know, I had only ever read about the Wallen incident, but the other day I actually listened to it, and man, that is a guy who has for sure said the n-word before.

As she noted in tweet, This is her first number 1 song as a writer, which also tells us a bit about Nashville and country music (unless one thinks the way this this song was written just happens to be more country chart friendly than anything else she has written; and I don't)

what does it tell us? "Vice" got to number 2 and she co-wrote that one. she's had plenty of number 1's as a performer.

yeah i think she means specifically that it's her first number 1 as a writer on which she also isn't a performer? bcuz she's def had number ones previously that she wrote on... "bluebird" most recently. i don't know how many songs she's written for other artists on which she also didn't sing, but i can't imagine it's that many. i don't think she was commenting on nashville or country radio, or that her tweet functions as such -- i think she was more alluding to the idea that it's a feather in a country songwriter's cap to have another artist take your song to no 1. or that's how i interpreted it anyway

i wouldn't assume that miranda's motivation here was purely cynical (just after money). like a true nashville lifer she loves having hits, which i'm sure was a motivating factor, but i don't think she needs money, tho i'm sure she likes that too. but i'd also point out the song is about reconciliation and redemption... it doesn't address the slur incident directly (or even indirectly) but like lots of wallen's music since then it feels like subtext that is clearly visible just beneath the surface. i think it's likely that this context -- a song addressed to mama from a wayward cowboy sung by someone who can very credibly assume the role of an unruly fuck up -- was some part of the appeal in either working w/ wallen or giving him this song. it hits themes and specific lyrical touchstones that are threaded thru her discography (references to parents, a specific a small town in the south, the narrator's childhood home) but it's also not a song that she would sing herself. the narrator in this song is really the type of guy who would typically be the subject of her songs... if the guy she sings about in "in these arms" wrote his own song it would prob be something like this one. which is all to say i think there were creative motivations here -- an opportunity for her to write from a different perspective than she does in her own music, and for the song to be loaded w/ a subtextual meaning that gives it added weight (if you're a listener willing to buy into the wallen redemption narrative... or the idea of redemption in a larger aka religious sense). so i think viewing this just thru financial (or political) lenses is a bit simplistic, if not off entirely.

For me the lack of cynicism is actually the worst part.

vomiting some thoughts sorry

part of me wonders i guess, without defending MW at all, at one point do we consider someone beyond the point of being redeemable for this kind of thing, going so far as to suggest those collaborating w/that person are themselves just like that person? i mean he had definitely said that word before! and who knows if getting caught using it was a splash of cold water that woke him up out of being an ignorant piece of shit, or if he's just going thru the motions to save his career and he secretly continues to harbor vile opinions.

but it seems like he has made some efforts. don't want to come off as railing against cancelling people (because plenty of people deserve it and then some) and i'm not privy to insider knowledge on either of these two, like i said, but it's possible to assume MW is maybe contrite, and ML is not actually in the klan.

HOWEVER! ML offering up a redemption arc song for MW could also be seen as a concerted effort to rescue a favored son while not herself doing much work to bridge any racial gaps in nashville (she's at absolute best stridently apolitical.)

going so far as to suggest those collaborating w/that person are themselves just like that person?

Can only speak for myself here obviously, but I'm not suggesting that in the least. I'm just disappointed because there are so many other performers out there she could have chosen to work with.

part of me wonders i guess, without defending MW at all, at one point do we consider someone beyond the point of being redeemable for this kind of thing, going so far as to suggest those collaborating w/that person are themselves just like that person?

He's irredeemable to critics and a subset of country listeners, but look at his streaming/sales figure. Dangerous didn't suffer a bit: it's been in the Billboard top ten for more than two years.

*figures

i mean i'm not buying any of his music, my suspicion being that while he's maybe not a literal card-carrying supremacist, he's contrite because he got caught, not because he said it. and miranda w/her clout and influence could do a lot more good than she chooses to do, something else than giving her imprimatur to MW.

HOWEVER! ML offering up a redemption arc song for MW could also be seen as a concerted effort to rescue a favored son while not herself doing much work to bridge any racial gaps in nashville (she's at absolute best stridently apolitical.)

― omar little, Wednesday, March 1, 2023 1:26 PM (six minutes ago)

she loves lgbts and is happy to talk about our rights and freedom! but that doesn't seem to be a third rail in country anymore certainly compared to issues of race or even gender. also her brother is gay

i'm assuming that the redemption arc aspect of this was absolutely part of the appeal -- again we're talking about people (generally speaking) where the idea of sinning, repenting, and being redeemed is foundational to how they view the world. but i also think that can be distinct from the more politicized contemporary idea of "let's take a bite out of cancel culture!" (and prob was in this case)

This was in a hit country song after all:

His old man was a rebel yeller
Bad boy to the bone
He'd say: "Can't trust that other fella."
He'd judge 'em by the tone of their skin
He was raised to think like his Dad
Narrow mind full of hate
On the road to nowhere fast
Till the grace of God got in the way
Then he saw the light an' hit his knees, an' cried, an' said a prayer
Rose up a brand new man
Left the old one right there

ftr I believe Morgan Wallen believes he has repented

i personally think wallen is redeemable. i also don't think his popularity in the face of the controversy is a huge outlier or says anything about country fans specifically. it's easy to believe that morgan wallen fans (or collaborators) are unrepentant culture warriors taking a stand against liberal values, and tho i'm sure those people do exist it's worth remembering that i.e. chris brown has had myriad huge hits in the last decade, that michael jackson's music still exists in the air around us the same way it did three decades ago, that lady gaga's queer liberal fanbase has forgiven her for doing a song w/ r kelly that went "do what you want w/ my body" a decade after he was indicted for having sex w/ a child on video, that kendrick has made it a clear point to speak up for and elevate artists like xxxtentacion & kodak black etc etc

whether he repented in a way that is satisfying to us or has had a legitimate change of heart or has suffered any consequences as a result is a different discussion. it seems like the answer to the first part is... probably no? but maybe it's yes. it's subjective at minimum. the second question is unknowable. the consequences aspect is slippery bcuz we're in an era of music consumption now where there's no barrier between artist & listener and every time we press play on a song or album it's recorded, tabulated & publicized. but certainly institutions did attempt to punish him, or did punish him. how pure those decisions were vs how cynical they were is also another discussion, but he was roundly censured by the country music community up to its highest levels. of course, they've all come back around, but again that's not unusual in the slightest when we're talking about an extremely popular musician w/ a hugely passionate active fanbase. that's the treatment they all get

within a few years there will probably be a country radio hit with lyrics tacitly implying that the gender-traitors are inviting the violence they're on the receiving end of so yeah i guess in that sense the lgbtqs aren't a third rail in country anymore

A little while ago I was trying to think of an R&B equivalent: SZA co-writing a song for Chris Brown, say.

i have nothing to say about this incident or miranda specifically except to add that the song that pop and adult contemporary stations quietly crossed over this past year (i'm guessing it's not a mistake that i never heard them back-announce his name while playing it) was so incredibly unremarkable and generic that it is funny to me that he is such a cause celebre among aggrieved right wingers

within a few years there will probably be a country radio hit with lyrics tacitly implying that the gender-traitors are inviting the violence they're on the receiving end of so yeah i guess in that sense the lgbtqs aren't a third rail in country anymore

― dyl, Wednesday, March 1, 2023 2:25 PM (five minutes ago)

weirdo post...

she loves lgbts and is happy to talk about our rights and freedom! but that doesn't seem to be a third rail in country anymore certainly compared to issues of race or even gender. also her brother is gay

lol I’m definitely not up on all this stuff so thanks for pointing it out!

I generally try to think the best of people I guess, playing a bit of devils advocate to an extent with my post or two up there when discussing possible worst case motives and what not. I think the R. Kelly is a decent comparison though I also think the total lack of apology and redemption and continued vile behavior on his part, coupled with most of the media and other artists completely ignoring it, makes it a lot worse. I do think MW was contrite because he got caught but I also think getting caught doing something can put things in new perspective for the person who is caught. And it can change them.

FWIW, I believe Gaga did address/apologize for the R. Kelly collab, and remove it from new versions of the album.

It’s all kind of unknowable but I do think one has to take him at his word and give him that chance, give him room to return and be a better person.

And that also means you know not turning Miranda Lambert into a grand wizard

If Wallen is turning up on right wing shows bitching about cancel culture then I'll assume his redemption is fake, but that isn't the case afaik

if i weren't a liberal i would think they were the biggest bunch of scolds. cut a guy a freakin' break.

Chlöe has a new single w/Chris Brown, btw... which isn't a Miranda analogy, but it's creating discussion (as you would expect)

I dunno, I think "irredeemable" is strong but I think it's the buoyant go-girl enthusiasm of the tweet that rankles. I didn't know she co-wrote a Wallen song, but I assume lots of people did and it's not like anyone made an issue of it. But the photo plus caption are pretty much social media shark chum, just seems very un-self-aware. Unwoke, you could say.

looool a little racism is cool "as a treat", lest we be considered scolds for saying otherwise

fwiw, I don't think he deserves to have his entire career blown out of existence or anything, it's just so funny to me that merely expressing disappointment in Lambert working with him is somehow being twisted into "turning Lambert into a grand wizard"

Nah I wasn’t referring to anyone here just referring to the tweet calling her pistol klannie which seemed a bit excessive maybe

She's a white lady from Texas, creepin' up on 40, married to a cop. Expectations heretofore may have been a touch unreasonable.

I was wondering if bringing up her marriage would be out of line or not

Well listen as someone with a cop in the family…I can’t dispute that point

J0rdan raised this point above, fwiw

Yeah and...

Her parents met while Bev was attending camp at Southern Methodist University and Rick was an on-campus undercover narcotics officer, and they got together a few years later. Rick is a former Dallas police officer who played in a country-rock group called Contraband in the 1970s. Rick and Bev later became private detectives and even worked on the high-profile case of the impeachment of President Bill Clinton.

Took me 30 seconds to find a facebook post where she used #backtheblue.