What Happened to Hard Work
Music City seems to be plagued by complacency. It’s bad enough to hear and see the mediocre country singers that are signed daily, but the amount of crap that is being churned out by country music talent shows is enough to make me projectile vomit. I have got a feeling that GAC’s new talent show, The Next GAC Star, is not going to be much different. The winner is offered a record deal, and a video on GAC. Desmond Child and Victoria Shaw have climbed on board as judges. They do have an impressive repetoire of compositions. Child has written Aerosmith’s giant hit “Dude(Looks Like a Lady),” Bon Jovi’s “You Give Love a Bad Name,” and a host of other songs. Shaw has penned the Garth Brooks’ classic ”The River” and Doug Stone’s “Too Busy Being In Love.” My co-worker Ben brought up a good point. Why isn’t there an A&R rep chosen to judge? These people are paid to hear 20 second clips of artists, and then say whether or not they are worth the time and money. Also, who was the captain obvious who came up with the shows title. Great Name! You might as well have called it, “Country Music Contract.” I just have no respect for contestants from these shows. Good country singers are dime a dozen in Nashville. To separate the good ones from the great ones is the ‘relevant’ factor. Twenty years from now, is this artist going to still be entertaining thousands with their music. However, it takes hard work, and unfortunately, talent to pull this off. It takes playing the small dives, and being turned down by record companies. Real Artists are not disheartened by rejection. They pull themselves up, invent a better mousetrap, and are signed to another record company. Then they rub their success into the faces of the naysayers.
But the real issue is, How are these shows still getting support? Singers, such as, Erika Jo and Buddy Jewell from Nashville Star have only been used for short monetary gain, and nothing substantial. The only critically acclaimed aritst that has precipitated from Nashville Star is Miranda Lambert, and she has only produced two top 15 hits. And who could trust the cache of judges that they choose from. Celebrities such as comedian Larry the Cable Guy and wrestler John Cena have been chosen to judge. What advise could they give to aspiring artists? There critique probably looks something like this- Larry the Cable Guy: “I am going to show you how a substandard comedian can trick the world into believing that I am the biggest redneck in the world. When really I grew up in Nebraska.” John Cena: “Good Job, just when you go for the high note, imagine that you are preparing to do a FU(his signature move) on an opponent.” Don’t get me started on the judges of Can You Duet? You have a complete tool with an emo haircut giving out vocal critique. You have a washed up female country artist that might as well be tearing the wings off of a butterfly. That would be more interesting than listening to the rambling nonsense that comes out of her cakehole. And while the third judge is an accomplished songwriter, you will never hear her on the radio. How can her opinion on image and presentation be taken seriously? Thanks Aimee for the advice. Now go play the Bluebird. (I am not knocking people who play the Bluebird. I am just making a point that they are songwriters, you will hardly ever hear them on the radio) Why don’t they give a country legend the chance to judge or at least guest judge. Wouldn’t it be incredbile to have George Jones or Merle Haggard critique the contestants? I don’t think it is that far out of the question. Real country stars would actually give these shows more clout. At least more than what the hacks on these shows have already given.
I tend to avoid these talent shows for a reason different from the talent level of the contestants. I think that sometimes, these shows focus too much on the negative comments from the judges (and they’re not necessarily critiques, either, but mean-spirited remarks about the contestants’ talent or lack thereof). Sure, you have outstanding talent like Carrie Underwood who win shows such as “American Idol” and go on to even greater heights, but “American Idol” and Underwood have been a few of the exceptions. (Remember, Sawyer Brown and Patsy Cline were also talent show award winners). The problem with Buddy Jewell, as pleasant as he was, was that when placed alongside other singers, he was not that distinctive; I haven’t heard Erika Jo’s music, but I’d imagine things were the same for her.
To me, it wouldn’t make a difference who was doing the critiquing, be it Merle or George or — and I know Todd you’ll cringe, but — Kellie Pickler. A great singer is a great singer, no matter who does the judging on these talent shows, and a non-distinctive singer will have a hit or two and then fade from the limelight. It’s not a knock against them at all; after all, I do think Buddy Jewell and Erika Jo worked hard, but in the end each of them didn’t have what was needed to make them lasting successes.
My recommendation is to avoid most of these talent shows. Too much focus on the backstage activities, mean-spirited and inane comments that have little to nothing to do with the performer or his/her talents and merits, and way too much focus on particiularly bad performers rather than the “outstanding” ones. At least “Star Search” didn’t air clips of bad singers’ auditions (although there were probably quite a few bad performances for varied reasons that did make it to air).
As for picking John Cena and Larry the Cable Guy — entertaining, but not music critics — to judge, my only guess is that they give real-world, listener insight into whether fans may like a singer. Which is fine, except that these are just “one man’s opinion.”