morgan wallen

It's got the same ominous trap/twang as "Old Town Road" and unfortunately is stuck in my head after a few listens.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kpz4Ro5iD1Q

Billboard Hot 100: #14(new) Broadway Girls, @lildurk Feat. @MorganWallen.

— chart data (@chartdata) December 28, 2021

Last night @opry you had a choice- either upset one guy and his “team,” or break the hearts of a legion of aspiring Black country artists. You chose wrong and I’m real sad for a lot of my friends today. Not surprised though. Just sad.

— Jason Isbell (@JasonIsbell) January 9, 2022

Wait so looking through the replies on that, someone is saying that "all about the Benjamins" is an anti-Semitic slur?

Has that always been a thing or is this new? I don't remember ever hearing or seeing anything tied to that phrase that was claimed to be anti-Semitic (aside from recent political posturing against Ilhan Omar but I tied that to her criticizing Israel by invoking a money stereotype rather than the specifics of using the term "Benjamins" to reference $100 bills)

I genuinely haven't heard that take until just now, be curious to know if this was a more widespread reading.

It does seem sprung from the Fox/etc coverage of Omar's tweet. Otherwise it's Ben Franklin 100%.

Never thought about it at all, but don't know the lyrics so looked it up and there's a line "You should do what we do, stack chips like Hebrews." Maybe that's what people mean? Apparently "Hebrews" has been (or is often?) edited out of the song?

Indeed, "Hebrews" is cut out here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0c58ppLPJcQ

(lol of course "all about the Benjamins" exists outside of the Puffy song, that's just where my mind first went to, so it's a weird coincidence that there is an anti-semitic connection!)

morgan wallen’s thoughtless redemption tour is the nail in the coffin of me realizing these systems, and this town is really not for us.

imma keep making my lil music in my attic, y’all can listen if you want. i don’t know that i’ll do this work forever.

— Joy Oladokun (@joyoladokun) January 9, 2022

no thanks! @PLPMngnt pic.twitter.com/FqafaC7XgE

— The Black Opry (@BlackOpry) January 10, 2022

I finally heard a Morgan Wallen song, ama

have you seen his hair

are you safe?

I have not seen his hair lately.

I am safe and extremely bemused.

how bad was it?

was it about drinking?

The worst thing about it was how anonymous it was. I am admittedly not a pop country person but I didn’t identify anything about it that would merit Wallen’s elevation above every other semi-talented hack half-assembly churning out pop country bullshit. There was absolutely nothing remotely like the turns of phrase or presentation of the confessional that Taylor Swift brings to the table, for example; it was just country brostep nonsense that I’m struggling to actually remember because it was so aggressively uninteresting to me.

I am embarrassed and sorry that I was captured on tape.

What if everytime a musician committed any infraction, their punishment was to have the Engineer pretend to hit record, and then release a blank CD on release day

In Wallen's case it would go platinum

Pretty sure I've still never heard a Morgan Wallen song but perhaps the worst part of this, the worst song I've ever been subjected to, was making sure to name check the racist country bro in the country bro rap track.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YnujskEgHnY

pull up
hop out
Walmart
late night

Christ, 31 of the top 50 songs on Spotify are by MW

Makes sense, probably a similar percentage of the rest of the internet is racist, too.

another victim of cancel culture

better not to look at this week’s Billboard Hot 100

Miranda Lambert's first co-write credit on a pop top ten single fwiw

I heard a Morgan Wallen song on a pop radio station this morning. I don't think I've ever heard them play a country song before.

still waiting on j0rdan's thoughts on the new album

where i will defend the previous album as a more or less front to back classic, this one is overly long, to put it mildly. i'm completely baffled by i.e. how there is a song that references keith whitley, and then another song, and then after that a song called "keith whitley" that doesn't seem to be in conversation at all w/ the song that 4 mins previously was referencing keith whitley over and over. just blatant stuff like that where i'm like, c'mon now. but i guess as a commerce play it's working for them. all that being said there's still a group of 15-18 songs that, as compiled into a playlist, is one of the best albums of the year for me.

i find him uniquely believable even w/in country as a deliverer of songs about substance abuse, and basically every song on this album is about substance abuse. idk that's been resonating w/ me this year, i won't get too much into it. but he's got people writing a lot of really great songs for him & he is a masterful performer of a lot of that work... even down to something as granular as the way he sings the word "jack" on "you proof." songs like "one thing at a time," "tennessee numbers," "keith whitley," "neon star," "98 braves" ... not a lot of stuff out there in any genre hitting for me like that. i guess i've made peace w/ who he is as a person, we'll see how it plays out

He seems to be trying to invoke whatever Keith Whitley represents for him -- this drunken angel who died too soon and too young -- but without the grace.

I liked about a third of the last album; this one just tired me out. "Tennessee Numbers" and "One Thing at a Time" totally work.

Every Morgan Wallen song I’ve heard has been at best terrible

I didn't bother giving this one another listen after the initial download.

jordan's post got me to listen to "you proof" - i like it!

The song I heard on pop radio was "Last Night." Makes sense--it has the same talk-singy quasi rap thing that you hear from the Jonas Brothers or any other male pop act these days.

'last night' is crazy. amazing song. whoever wrote that put their foot in it

I absolutely hated “You Proof”

same

I don't think I've ever heard them play a country song before.

they hadn't played any dan + shay, florida georgia line (tbh the first time i heard "last night" i thought maybe it was them, lol), lady antebellum, gabby barrett or whatever?

quite a few country songs are being crossed over radio-wise rn actually. there's a kane brown ballad w/ his wife from not too long ago that's... eh. also some parmalee song that's extremely boring and undistinguished. and a luke combs cover of "fast car" that is competent but whose most interesting part is that the 'checkout girl' lyric is left unaltered.

My primary thing, which I’ve purposely avoided spelling out given the rest of the context of this thread, is that this guy’s music is such absolute horseshit that I don’t understand why anyone posting here would give him the time of day after his well-documented racist outburst, given the political demographics of the posters in this thread.

otm

My primary thing, which I’ve purposely avoided spelling out given the rest of the context of this thread, is that this guy’s music is such absolute horseshit that I don’t understand why anyone posting here would give him the time of day after his well-documented racist outburst, given the political demographics of the posters in this thread.

― Marvel Puzzle Quest is my favorite gasm (DJP), Tuesday, May 9, 2023 8:41 AM (two hours ago)

well, i don't think his music is horseshit... the first post of this thread makes that clear. your point is an "if a, then b" statement but a doesn't apply to me. so then what? it's an internal negotiation about how much one likes art made by a person who says or does things that are otherwise offensive to one's sensibilities. unless you're someone who is driving an extremely hard line on what kinda art you consume, this isn't a very atypical situation. as a gay guy who grew up listening to rap music, i am -- for better or worse -- quite practiced at the art of compartmentalizing artists i love from the offensive things that they say. i never stopped loving lil wayne even though he rapped about how "you homos" are "getting AIDS in the ass" on a hit song that was played on the radio all the time. i loved the song. i still love the song! and i still hear that song. i'm not saying everyone should compartmentalize to that degree, but tons of people do, even now. i was just at a janet jackson concert last night & when she performed "scream" they showed clips of michael from the video & the crowd went crazy. no one could argue w/ a straight face that morgan wallen is a worse human being than a serial child rapist -- is it just that michael's music is so good that he clears some bar? or that his crimes and music are so far in the past that we don't really need to confront them? that they weren't caught on tape?

i mean, m@tt, since you enthusiastically otm'd the post... you're one of the biggest hip hop heads on this board. as a politically progressive, anti-sexist, anti-homophobe, you must have pretty developed thoughts on listening to music made by ppl who say things, or hold views that are, offensive to you. or is it just that the rap music you like isn't horseshit enough?

i mean am as full of shit as anyone else wrt to this stuff, yes.

though i do find the wallen thing particularly shitty, as it's pretty clear that his support among a large part of his audience actually grew as a result. like he's bigger and more ubiquitous than ever, and honestly a lot of this is having grown up in the rural midwest it's always grated on me the degree to which ilx seemed to have this weirdly idealized idea of who the audience for country music was.

but you're point about hip hop esp w/homophobia is well taken

as a gay guy who grew up listening to rap music, i am -- for better or worse -- quite practiced at the art of compartmentalizing artists i love from the offensive things that they say. i never stopped loving lil wayne even though he rapped about how "you homos" are "getting AIDS in the ass" on a hit song that was played on the radio all the time. i loved the song.

or simpler - i understand your thought process here but i think it's like how pundits would try to say people loved trump "despite" all the shit he said, but they specifically loved what he said. i think wallen got more popular because of what he said, which in fairness isn't what we were debating though.

though sometimes i do find it hard to listen to some old time rap favs from the 80s and 90s now, it's easy to forget how ugly it was wrt homophobia and i'll hear some song i haven't heard in years and be like goddamn that is hateful, like brand nubian is hard for me, partially because of jamar, just one example

I posted remarks similar to sarge's in the other thread.

i can't listen to death certificate much these days, despite it being just an amazingly produced album.

it's pretty clear that his support among a large part of his audience actually grew as a result.

This is a ridiculous claim

i can listen to Death Certificate mostly because of how educational it was to me about racial tension in America, things I hadn't really been exposed to in my charmed life. I just skip "Black Korea" and the song where he says his ass is a virgin mostly