Because, honestly, one might say that both generes are in a rut right now.
You can view the video for "Cruise - Remix" here.
Monday, September 1, 2014
Florida Georgia Line and Nelly-- Pioneers For Country
In late 2012, a modern country duo, Florida Georgia Line, released their major label debut, Here's To The Good Times. The album was an immidiate hit, getting to #1 on the Country Airplay chart by mid-December. One of the songs on the album that was the first major hit, "Cruise," later sparked some large anger both by fans of hip-hop and fans of country music. FGL decided to collaborate with a popular rap artist, Nelly, on Cruise. The song, arguably a far cry from the original song, now featured many aspects of pop music. Alterd voices, raps, and stuff like that. Neither scene was quite happy, to say the least. The song still crawled the charts, but being on the radio fueled the hate. On some of the top-rated youtube comments, you can see things like "Nelly... please stop hanging out with these untalented idiots" or "this song sucks" (which was the top comment for 16 weeks straight.) Things got obscene and racist, too. "I refuse to listen to this. Get these fucking rappers out of this country," "This is not country this is fucking shit and why are they hanging out with that monkey." Stuff like that. I, however, say (like some of the commenters on the youtube vid,) that the "Cruise" remix is a song that shows a bright future for music. Both genres have a lot of talent in them, and there's no reason that they don't collaborate! The pop-country with rap worked. This defenitely has the potential to create a new sub-genre of hip hop and country. While it meets in the middle at just pop, really, I can envision much more country-oriented or much more hip-hop oriented songs like this one.
Because, honestly, one might say that both generes are in a rut right now.
You can view the video for "Cruise - Remix" here.
Because, honestly, one might say that both generes are in a rut right now.
You can view the video for "Cruise - Remix" here.
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I'm with you on this one, Daniel, but not in this particular case. Nelly and FGL took a song that was already only popular for its catchiness and amplified it by bringing in pop and hip hop elements that almost made it seem like a bridge between cultures, when it really just made a mockery of every one of them involved. That said, a hip hop-country blend could truly work, and the two genres continue to move closer to each other, for better or worse. Hopefully, though, the result will be the former.
ReplyDeleteWell, my argument isn't so much about the song as it is the general idea of what happened-- Nelly, a hip hop artist, and FGL, a country duo, took their music and made it one thing. Yes, it was already catchy, but it had to start somewhere, right? So I think we are pretty much in agreement here.
DeleteI really don't think that this song is worthy of such a debate. The song worked and that really should be that. While I'm not a big enough fan of either Country or Hip Hop to get into the debate, I think that the only people against it are the over-spoken majority. In the future Hip Hop and Country music might see more collaborations that the silent majority can enjoy.
ReplyDeleteLol, maybe the song isn't worthy. But it's a great example, because I haven't seen much else like it! I think we're mainly in agreement here. Thanks for the comment, josh!
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