Y’all Really Believe This Hype?
Starting off year end season with breaking down the post hype reality for 2022’s most hotly anticipated albums.
In lieu of one yearly round up, I was thinking about making a couple smaller posts and spreading them out over the last couple of weeks. No real reason, but I thought it would be different and perhaps more digestible.
Part of the experience of musical discovery, especially in the social media age, is the hint of a new album coming down the pipeline. Maybe there’s an Instagram teaser or some cryptic posts on social media. Perhaps you’re at a concert and hear an unreleased song. A fresh single gets released to country radio or just into the Spotify ether and the juices start. The feeling of anticipation is in the air, your friends start texting you about it, the hype starts to build, and then finally, after some span of time, the album gets released. Sometimes the album lives up to expectations and sometimes it doesn’t. This anticipatory excitement is a key part of the experience. It is intrinsic to your recollection of the album. When you go back five years from now and listen to that album, you’ll remember that feeling you had before it came out. In many ways, we relate to albums, both in the present and the future, based heavily on our expectations going into it.
I want to focus on a few albums this year that in my mind and the crew I surround myself with were heavily hyped. Some lived up to the hype, some did not. Let's discuss that.
The story of country music in 2022 cannot be told without discussing Zach Bryan. The hype has been building since early 2019 when YouTube videos started surfacing of this intense and raw figure. The past couple of years have seen a honing of that figure into a very particular identity. Sonically a potpourri of southern and heartland rock, folk, and country with storytelling from the heart, poetic songwriting, and a je ne sais quoi which deeply clicks with youthful audiences across the country.
The Zach Bryan story is one and the same as the story of the internet born musician. Many artists don’t understand the Internet, or if they do, they stay away from it. The celebrity Instagram pages or Twitter pages are often manned by committees of employees, serving mostly as a means to post pictures, post upcoming schedules, ticket links etc. There are some artists that do a better job than others in having a unique social media presence, but no artist has made it so much a part of their identity and their story as Zach Bryan. As such, it is quite natural that the American Heartbreak album era (which in a technical sense only lasted a few weeks before his summertime blues EP) would be defined by the internet. Namely the never ending hype beforehand, cryptic twitter messages, teasers, acoustic clips and unreleased songs. The absolute onslaught of content that was on the actual album is also a creation of the digital age. Streaming is not just the way that the youth now relate to music, but their relationship to music is defined by the new norms streaming has created. Remember that the youth movement of today is tomorrow’s reality, albeit with a few tweaks. The Zach Bryan rubric similarly seems to be the future, albeit with a few tweaks.
Was the album worth the hype? I’m not the man to answer that question. Personally I don’t relate to the overly melancholy nature of his music. From the sonic perspective as well, neither the overly stripped acoustic stuff or the rootsy Dave Cobb styling hits for me although I can appreciate it. His voice possesses a very particular tone. Unique, but again, not my cup of tea. Putting my personal quibbles aside, it is undeniably impressive to put out 30-40 songs in one year which are quality. Merely putting out a solid 10-15 song project is hard enough and Bryan has exceeded that both quality and quantity wise. Certainly it could’ve been improved with some editing. A top tier 22 song album is definitely there with some judicious editing to cut fat and redundancy. That hypothetical album is probably a better album, but wouldn’t exemplify what Zach Bryan is as well,and therefore I say it is great as is. Also, it certainly seems as if his fans really love it considering those eye-popping streaming numbers.
The ruling: Yes, it lived up to the hype.
Another album that received a tremendous amount of hype was Flower Shops by ERNEST (hereinafter referred to via the standardized capitalization scheme of his nom de plume). Ernest masterfully built hype for the album, and specifically for the title track which was featuring Morgan Wallen. This was accomplished via a bevy of teasers and acoustic recordings on Instagram and his podcast, and by the time he announced his actual song was coming, the strongest fans had already heard effectively the entire song. The only question remaining was about the production style. This has actually backfired for a number of artists, because listeners become accustomed to hearing a song in a more stripped down acoustic style bringing out a more subtle, soft, and raw side of the song. Then when the fully fleshed out produced version drops all awash in strings and the full strength of Nashville production bringing out a different element of this song, it can be disconcerting. The Sam Hunt song 23 notably fell victim to this string of events.
I think it’s fair to say that no matter how good the album was to your eyes, the hype was impossible. Flower Shops was presented as this utter unicorn, a trendy up-to-date song featuring the hottest artist in the business, and yet possessing this retro vibe soaked in steel and acoustics. It was supposed to be this modern radio hit and also be evocative of George Jones songs. That’s a very high bar. Red hot hype ensued.
Then the song actually dropped and it was merely fine. It kind of just sounded like a very solid, slightly more country Morgan Wallen song with a lot more steel guitar. There is tremendous value in a song with traditional accompaniment being pushed to country radio and being embraced by one of the biggest stars in the game. However, for all the buzz, the song was unable to transcend the moment. It did fine on country radio until Morgan Wallen pushed his next song and radio stopped playing Flower Shops.
The album promised to be this cinematic journey through love and heartbreak. It did stick to a general theme with a couple nice angles and decent writing, but it didn’t add up to more. To solve for why, let us focus on Ernest as an artist. He’s clearly a talented writer with a knack for a good turn of phrase. So what fails?
For some odd reason, we demand that our singers be songwriters. Most Nashville artists do time writing for others before they've earned their stripes. Only after that does the industry open doors for the artist to embark on a singing career. Practically speaking, that means the industry filters for traits that don't necessarily manifest in the best results. Filtering country artists for songwriting talent would exclude a George Strait type who is not the greatest writer, but has a genuine skill as an interpreter of song. There is a craft to a singer. It's not just someone with a pleasing tone. Genuine vocal talent exists and it isn't correlated much with being a great songwriter. The same way we don't expect songwriters or singers to also act as their own producers because we want the best producers to arrange and mix the music, we shouldn't expect songwriters to be the singers if we want the best singers to rise to the top. The end product is handicapped and we end up with well written and well produced albums with subpar vocalists trying their best.1
This is the undermining element to the Ernest record. Ernest’s tone is not particularly powerful and that doesn't mesh well on some of the tracks with thicker production. His voice almost seems to be swallowed up in comparison. His tranquil tone doesn’t give off a tremendous amount of personality. Compare his vocals to the other members of the three amigos: Hardy and Morgan Wallen. Hardy possesses a tremendous sense of energy. In spite of his vocal limitations, he brings a compelling sense of personality and energy. It reminds me how Kix Brooks wasn’t the greatest singer, especially relative to Ronnie, so he brought something unique to the table with his live performances and boundless energy and personality. The other easy comp is Morgan Wallen, who doesn't have the greatest range, or the clearest tone, but has a masterful ability in his delivery to be able to switch up cadences fluidly and naturally. He has a tremendous sense of melody and rhythm, and is able to become one with the song, almost as if his voice is just another instrument. That sense of cohesion is amplified by the production2 and the writing, and it comes together to something which is more than sum of the parts. This is the special sauce that a singer can bring to a collection of songs that this album to me seems to be missing.
Re. the hype: yeah, I guess it was good, but not enough for the hype.
The third album that received tremendous hype this year was the reigning king of country music, Luke Combs. My thoughts on the album as a whole are documented here3. Suffice it to say I really enjoyed the project. However, for the purposes of this post, my personal feelings don’t matter a significant amount. We are here to measure the hype and take an accounting of the feelings of the room in the post hype reality.
Luke Combs is the ten thousand pound gorilla of country music. Only Morgan Wallen comes close to his popularity. Zach Bryan may be rising, but doesn’t have as widespread name recognition to be a threat at the moment. Bryan is driven by a cohort of passionate fans who endlessly consume his content. Combs has a dedicated fan base, but also appeals to casuals. Beer Never Broke My Heart is well on its way to being the 2020s equivalent of Friends in Low Places. I enjoy Something in the Orange as much as anyone, but it’s not quite there yet. (I could see this take aging terribly, but at the moment I think it describes the current state of things.)
Naturally, when Combs announced his upcoming album, the hype was massive. Curiously, there was a tempered counter- hype. Sentiments like “Combs is a one trick pony”, “Combs needs to evolve otherwise he’ll become boring”, “Combs only puts out love songs and drinking songs so it’ll probably be mid” were offered up trying to quench the excitement of the masses.
It is interesting to see just how powerful radio singles are in shaping the perception of a mainstream artist. The now common complaint about Combs only putting out drinking and love songs isn’t really true if you look at his albums as a whole. For every Cold As You, there is a Does For Me. For every Forever After All, there is an Angels Workin’ Overtime. On the deluxe edition of LC2, approximately six songs were love songs, another five were breakup songs, and two or three were drinking songs. This is out of a colossal twenty three tracks! That means that roughly half the album was devoted to topics not considered part of the “classic same old Combs stuff”. Combs’ albums explore the everyman in all aspects, among which are love, loss, and man’s relationship with the bottle. He also expands beyond that basic template and explores identity, pride in everyday accomplishment, gratitude, nostalgia and many other relatable topics. His singles are curated for maximum impact on radio and aim to provide a more sophisticated treatment of the populist tropes radio relishes. That dynamic was true of both his first two albums thus far. The complaints seemed more aimed at a Combs caricature built solely on listening to his radio singles. That feels noteworthy as we transition this amorphous period of declining but still powerful radio and the growing power of streaming.
But enough about that. Did LC3- Growing Up live up to the generally high but slightly tempered hype? I think mostly yes. It built enough upon his foundation enough that it didn’t feel like an extension of LC2. It furthered the traditional sound that has increasingly been developing into Combs’ signature. As an album it was tighter then previous projects, owing in great part to the shorter track length. It suffers most in individual songs. There are no songs that immediately jump off the album as being the next iconic Luke Combs song. Ain’t no When It Rains It Pours or Beer Never Broke My Heart on this album. This, in combination with the duality in perspective discussed above, would render a split decision. If you are a devotee of the album experience, then the album lived up to the hype by being a rock solid, tasteful forward focused progression of Luke Combs as an artist whilst maintaining his artistic and creative core. If you are more focused on the singles, then I think the album falters and doesn’t live up to the hype.
Hype; yes or no? Verdict: complicated but Joe feels yes.
This is the first end of year post, hoping to be able to write a couple more. After the colossal effort required in writing the three part Musings Behind the Music series (if you haven’t read all three parts, please check them out on the homepage. I think they really stand out relative to my usual work), this shorter more focused style of content was a refreshing change.
Does end of year content have to be finished by the new year or is it ok to have year end content in January? Never understood why December 1st should be the “end of the year”. Regardless, we have more coming down the pipeline for the end of year season and I’m very excited!
Signing off for now,
Joe4
Editor Joe here….. man this came across spicier than I realized. I like it. Maybe I’ll revisit this idea in a future post. Maybe a debate style thing presenting each side of the topic. I could see that being fun.
I just realized that this comes across as me complimenting Joey Moi. Well dangit, I think I just did. In my defense, he’s come a long way since his early “country” material.
Yeah, I just recently discovered the footnotes add-on. What gave that away?