Gwyneth Paltrow took to the stage last night during the CMA Awards and performed the title song from her upcoming movie “Country Strong.” Super talent Vince Gill assisted her along with other top notch players. She looked amazing in an all black super tight high heeled get up. She had a beautiful Gibson six string acoustic to strum on while she sang pretty damn well to a nicely assembled song with a good hook. When she was finished the entire Nashville establishment rose to their feet and gave her a standing ovation.
Here’s the clip in full of the performance:
When you add it all up her performance was a really pleasant abomination.
There’s a stark dividing line out there in the country world between what is played on the radio and what many others define as country music. Tune into your area station that “plays the biggest and best new hits” from Taylor Swift, Keith Urban, and Toby Keith and you’ll hear what you heard last night from a fine actress. A well produced and pleasant listening experience that lacks one critical thing, GUTS.
Sure, Gwyneth is an easy target but the fact that she did a good job and was really on par with the other performances of the night should be a big alarm blaring out to the self proclaimed country music industry. “You have lost your guts!” You can put a good hook in a tune, you can flavor it with twang and you can sing about being “Country Strong” but without the guts it’s not country music in any discernible way. It’s easy listening music plain and simple.
I’ve got no problem with fans of this brand of music. To each his own, but I do have a prideful streak when it comes to my heroes like Dwight and Emmy Lou having their music lumped together with what was witnessed last night. Apples and oranges and the difference is all about guts. I’ll go as far as to say that I kind of enjoyed Gwyneth’s turn at playing a singing star but lets call a spade a spade. She was no country star last night she was an easy listening star.
I’ve come to understand that Nashville is about making money. There’s nothing wrong with that and if it were my livelihood I’d be pushing acts that minted money too. Recently a flood devastated the area and left the home of country music, the Ryman Auditorium, under water. Well if you’ve been listening to hot country radio for the last decade you’d know that Nashville has been watered down for a long time.
Along with that watering down much of what was definable about the original art form, plain and simple poetic truth infused with guts, has been whisked away to the backrooms and back pages. This is a little sad but I know there will always be folks starving to hear country filled with guts and that there will always be artists out there blessed with the real thing. You just have to look harder these days.
Robbie Fulks: Georgia Hard
Top Photo: UPI/Terry Wyatt
