So I’ve just spent the last 5-6 weeks working somewhere that I hear continual contemporary country music (except for the one time that they played each Jolene and The Gambler) for 9 hours a day, twice a week. That works out to about 90 hours of this stuff in the last month or so. Nice. To keep things clear, I cannot stand this genre of music. I couldn’t stand it before I’d really ever heard any of it, and I certainly can’t now. But I must say that it was a learning experience.

I’ve never really heard any modern country music before and since this was a “top-40″ style station, there were many songs that I heard 3-5 times per day, each of those days (to paraphrase one of their slogans “all the greatest songs played over and over and over…”).

Now, in general, the country songs sung by the ladies are alright; sad “lost love” type songs. Which is fine, even if they are a bit trite and the style if boring. But the dude songs? Man. I can listen to the classics: Cash, Williams, Haggard… Those are great songs about loneliness, loss and too many drunken evenings, but that’s not what these new songs are about. These songs covered exciting territory like: four-wheel drives, Jesus and America. And that’s about all.

They also had a strong focus on what I would call intentional ignorance. A blatant support for the idea of “I don’t care what the truth might be, because whatever my daddy said is good enough for me”. It was actually quite depressing.

High points? Here are some of my “favorites”..

Some obnoxious song called Chickenfry. Here are the lyrics that really twisted my tongue:

Salute the ones who died
The ones that give their lives so we don`t have to sacrifice
All the things we love
Like our chicken fried

Cold beer on a Friday night
A pair of jeans that fit just right
And the radio up

I mean, is this their view of world affairs? Saddam and Bin Laden were out to get rid of the cold beer and fried chicken so we have to go and kill hundreds of thousands of foreigners who haven’t even heard of either?

Another one that thought bought up a fine grasp of the world was this:

I watch CNN but I’m not sure I can tell you
The difference in Iraq and Iran
But I know Jesus and I talk to God
And I remember this from when I was young

So these are the folks who says “Support our Troops?” Which, in their eyes seems to mean send them to kill and die in other countries and don’t question it? “Invade/bomb/take over Iran/Iraq? Sure, since I don’t even know what those are”. It’s nice that they are so fond of this country and will stand behind mass destruction of other people and their countries without even caring to know what those nations are.

Especially since they seem to have a rather naive view of this country. These guys would be the first to say “Yay America! Yay “Democracy”! And yay to capitalism and the American way”. Yet they write these lyrics that show that they have no grasp of what this American capitalist way is that they love so much:

Because in the real world they’re
Shutting Detroit down
While the boss man takes his
Bonus pay and jets on outta town

What? Do they think that someone should be intervening with the bosses on behalf of the workers? Wouldn’t these same folks call that activity “socialism and/or communism (who can tell the difference)”, the same stuff that has also been out to get rid of our beer and fried chicken? How stupid can people be? And how desperately must these people stick to their frightened ignorance and stupidity in the glow of reality and knowledge all around? It’s very lame.

Finally, this lyric was just irritating… Especially when played over and over again in a song that I had to hear over and over every day.

‘Cause I’m a country boy, I’ve got a 4-wheel drive
Climb in my bed, I’ll take you for a ride