Fruit or candy? It’s all country

Probably dating myself here, but do you remember the old ad campaign for raisins, “one man’s fruit is another man’s candy?” If you think about it, it’s a pretty good way to look at life for just about everything — TV, movies, restaurants, cars, books, sports, music, etc.

Everybody’s got different tastes. Especially when it comes to music. We’ve discussed this before — how some of my friends have declared to me on more than one occasion, “Sorry, Nancy, I just don’t like country music.” Then I always ask them if they like Carrie Underwood, Keith Urban, Taylor Swift, Lady Antebellum, Blake Shelton, Tim McGraw, Rascal Flatts and so on. They usually roll their eyes and say, “Of course!” Congratulations, you like country!

It’s one thing to take flak from my friends, we’re not country superstars. Imagine what it might be like to get not-so-great feedback from a fellow artist?

Luke Bryan’s latest single, “That’s My Kind of Night,” is on track to be another number one hit. With lyrics like, “Might sit down on my diamond plate tailgate, put in my country rock hip-hop mix tape, little Conway, a little T-Pain, might just make it rain,” it may not go down in history as a game changer, but it’s not supposed to. In what’s become known as “hick hop” country, it’s just a fun goofy tune.

But fellow artist Zac Brown took it further. In a recent interview on a Vancouver radio station, Zac said, “I love Luke Bryan and he’s had some great songs. But this new song is one of the worst songs I’ve ever heard. … Country fans and country listeners deserve to have something better than that, a song that really has something to say … when songs make me want to throw up, it makes me ashamed to even be in the same genre as those songs.”

This was not a direct rant on Luke the person. “I know Luke,” Zac said. “He’s a friend. ” It was about Luke’s song.

The reaction to Zac’s words has been strong. Jason Aldean recently told the Province in Vancouver that while he likes Zac (“He’s always been cool to me”), he doesn’t like what he said. “As an artist, you’re not going to like everything every other artist does … but I’m not publicly going to go out and trash them. … Luke’s one of my best friends and it rubbed me wrong … I don’t agree with any artist bashing another artist.”

I recently spoke with Justin Moore, who said, “Music is subjective, you’re not going to like everything everyone does.”

Justin is also close with Luke, calling him, “a friend and a great guy, a great husband and a great father.” Justin says he can’t understand why Zac would even go there. “I don’t see the upside to it. You never look good by trying to make somebody else look bad.”

In the meantime, there’s been absolutely no reaction from Luke about Zac’s comments. While I will defend Zac’s right to express his opinion about the song, here’s hoping he will leave Luke’s dancing alone. He might have a fight on his hands then, because, that’s an entirely different kind of candy!

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