This is one example of why Wal-Mart country will never become unpopular, even though nobody I know seems to openly embrace it: It’s flexible, and it’s reflexive. It’s flexible because nobody in the media (outside of Tennessee) seems to care how it operates, so it can quietly make adjustments and corrections to fit its zeitgeist; country music evolves a little like the stock market. It’s reflexive because it doesn’t place an artistic premium on creating new ideas; nobody expects Clint Black to be the first guy to come up with anything. Nobody even expects him to write his own songs. As a consequence, the organic themes in Wal-Mart country filter up from its audience. They actually come from the people shopping in Wal-Mart. And when those Wal-Mart shoppers eventually hear their own ideas on the radio, it somehow seems fresh. While rock and hip-hop constantly try to break through to a future consciousness—and while alt country tries to replicate a lost consciousness from the 1930s—modern country artists validate the experience of living right here, right now.
This started to become clear as glass in the early 1990s. At the time, the presumption in the media was that grungy Sasquatch rockers were emerging as a more “realistic” reflection of public sentiment, apparently because the musicians dressed like laid-off factory employees and down-tuned their guitars. This was not without justification; I will concede that this posit seemed completely sensible at the time. But—with the exception of the second Nirvana album, the first three Pearl Jam records, and maybe four or five Soundgarden songs—that music has not sustained a significant life outside its brief window of import. Most of that music already comes across as dated as disco. But what has continued to matter are crappy country songs like Trisha Yearwood’s 1991 single “She’s in Love with the Boy,” which probably means it isn’t entirely crappy.
“She’s in Love with the Boy” is almost like something the Ronettes could have done: A sweet girl named Katie is dating a local bone head named Tommy, and everyone in town—particularly Katie’s father—thinks she can do better. However, their love is ultimately vindicated by Katie’s mother, who explains that she was once dating a local bone head whom everyone hated, and that man became Katie’s father. Certainly, this is not an innovative narrative (in fact, I think it was actually an episode from the 1991 season of The Wonder Years, costarring David Schwimmer as “the bone head”). However, there are two elements to this song that make it amazingly evocative to a certain kind of listener. The irony is that they’re the same elements that make intellectuals despise modern country music.
The first is that the lyrics to this song are highly specific, but secretly universal. I’m referring particularly to lines like “But later on, outside the Tastee Freeze / Tommy slips something on her hand / He says, “My high school ring will have to do / Till I can buy a wedding band.” Proposing marriage at a Tastee Freeze is not exactly romantic, but it is important, just as it was when scruffy little Johnny Cougar mentioned eating chili dogs “outside the Tastee Freeze” in the song “Jack and Diane.” Tastee Freezes are iconic structures in the rural Midwest, because they say something about your hometown; they irrefutably prove your community does not have enough of a population to sustain a Dairy Queen. In fact, you don’t even have enough of a population to sustain an ice cream facility with indoor seating (you might notice that both Yearwood and Cougar describe encounters that take place outside the Tastee Freeze, presumably in the parking lot). Tastee Freezes are the places that remind you how isolated you are; a Tastee Freeze is like an oasis. And even though they’re everywhere, you don’t realize that until you move away. It’s a circular reality: Tastee Freezes exist where people are disconnected from the rest of the world—and that very disconnection makes them all seem autonomous. So when Yearwood mentions this kind of coquettish proposal between two overtly archetypical teenagers, it cuts an amazingly wide swath. It’s what David Berman means when he says that Wal-Mart country reflects the lives of its audience. There are thousands of people in this country who still can’t believe Trish Yearwood perfectly described the teenage experience of someone they know in real life. And the amazing thing is that they’re all correct.
However, there’s another reason why a song like “She’s in Love with the Boy” is so successful, and it’s even less complicated. “She’s in Love with the Boy” is easy to understand—and I don’t mean intellectually. I mean literally. A huge part of why somebody like Yearwood connects so deeply with so many people (she has career sales approaching 11 million) is because her words can be easily heard and immediately contextualized, even when a person casually hears them one time. I’m sure that sounds like a moronically obvious argument for what makes a piece of music good, but I’ve come to realize it’s one of those painfully obvious things that everyone who’s allegedly enlightened seems to deny.
Whenever you talk to collegiate musicologists about music, they will often complain that rock writers place entirely too much emphasis on the content of song lyrics. Academics tend to argue that lyrics have only nominal importance; they will say that pop critics tend to see pop songs as having two parts—words and music—and that this is an example of ignorance. They think the words to a song like the Beatles’ “Helter Skelter” are only a fraction of the total creation; the lyrics have no more individual importance than the guitar chords, or Ringo’s drum fills, or George Martin’s production, or any other component. Moreover, they’ll tell you that song lyrics are not really poetry, because they only matter when they’re married to a specific piece of music and are often used as filler; lyrics usually say very little about the songwriter and are more important for how practical they are (i.e., “Can I match a melody to this?”) than for how deep they are (i.e., “What does this mean?”). What’s funny is that rock writers sort of validate those suggestions, but only because they take the appreciation of lyrical content too far. They’re exclusively focused on how clever lyrics are, even if that cleverness is only appreciated by their peers (for example, rock critics love David Berman’s buddy Stephen Malkmus, and he is indeed very talented—although I sometimes wonder how funny jokes about Geddy Lee’s voice are to people who have never listened to a Rush album).[60]
The net result of all this is that discernible lyrics are—by and large—dismissed. The elitist belief is that hearing what an artist is saying is either (a) totally irrelevant, or (b) only relevant when difficult. And what these elitists forget is that normal people never think like that. Normal people want to hear what artists are saying, and normal people tend to perceive the vox as the sole identity of the artistic product. This is completely clear to anyone who steps back and just looks at what material works outside of New York and L.A. I find it amusing that so many pundits have tried to create explanations for why Eminem is so polarizing (people say that it’s just because he’s white, or that it’s all because of Dr. Dre, or that it’s just because he’s controversial, etc.). To me, the biggest reason is obvious: He enunciates better than any rapper who ever lived. He’s literally good at talking. The first time you hear an Eminem song, you can decide whether or not you find him entertaining. That seems to be a central quality for anyone who deeply resonates with blue-collar Americans. I once did a feature for SPIN magazine that tried to explain why Morrissey has become a cult figure with Latino teenagers in California, and I suggested a variety of explanations for why a forgotten, asexual Oscar Wilde fanatic would resonate with Hispanic kids in EastL.A. What I came to realize is that relating to Morrissey is easy for anyone who puts forth the effort to try; Moz sings about universal problems (loneliness, alienation, emotional fraud), and he sings about those problems in a way that’s oddly literal. His voice is clear, the meanings can be appreciated on two (and sometimes three) different levels, and you can always hear every thought. He lets you get close to him. I’m more surprised that Latinos are the only kids who still love him.