Country Strong

Although I was not particularly fond of the movie, Country Strong outlines one of the major points present in today’s controversy between mainstream country and Americana/roots country.  Garrett Hedlund plays the part of Beau, a devoted Americana country artist who cares nothing for fame, but rather just staying true to his music and himself.  He is offered an opening position for a superstar Nashville country artist named Kelly Canter (played by Gwyneth Paltrow) and despite being opposed to the “country barbie” type of music being played by the other opener, Chiles Stanton (played by Leighton Meester), and Canter, he reluctantly  agrees to do the gigs.  One of the underlying themes of the movie, is that the character Beau, is very opposed to the type of music played by Canter and Stanton and that and this is portrayed when Beau has a very difficult time allowing himself to be the opener for music that he is so critical of.  I think this same message transfers to how many Americana/Texas Country artists and fans feel overall about mainstream country.  Despite the fact that the mainstream country genre has a much larger fan base throughout the US and therefore more potential for growth,  the Americana/Texas Country artist would have to ‘sell out’ in order to be a part of that music scene.

On a side note, Hayes Carll (who won the award for emerging Americana artist of the year in 2010), had three songs featured in the film’s soundtrack, one of which was performed by Hedlund (Beau).