It’s difficult to say with any definitiveness what is or isn’t country music. The term has always meant different things to different people, and it has always encompassed more than one stylistic vein at any given time in the genre’s history.
The emergence of Americana as a full-fledged genre with a distinct audience complicates the issue even more. Many of the artists embraced by Americana (like 2010 “Artist of the Year” Ryan Bingham) make it a point say that they’re not country, yet many of Americana radio’s most played albums in 2010 came from artists like Willie Nelson and Patty Loveless.
So, creating a list of the year’s “best country music” is as much an art as it is a science. Why is Taylor Swift called country, but Justin Townes Earle isn’t?
To some extent, it has to do with proclamation. Does the artist in question consider himself or herself to be a country artist? And, to some extent, it has to do with context. Does the music fit what a reasonable person would think of as country music?
Finally, and perhaps most of all, it has to do with how the definer hears the music. Sugarland says they’re a country band, and The Incredible Machine was marketed as a country album. Surely, if you ask most people what kind of music The Incredible Machine is, they’ll say it’s country music. When I listen to that album, however, I don’t hear anything that relates back to any of the things that I know country music to be. Not the production, the musical approach or the construction of the lyrics.
Of course, I reviewed that album right here on this country blog.
Every case is unique, and every case has to be evaluated based on whatever criteria one chooses to use. Many of the artists on this list could have be featured on one of our country lists. They weren’t, but that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be mentioned in conversations about country music.
I hope that this list inspires you to explore music that you might have otherwise missed.
To help you along with that exploration, we’ve created a MOG playlist that features all of the “recommended tracks” from this list. MOG is a brilliant, cloud-based music application that gives you access to over 8 million songs on your computer or mobile device for $10 per month. I use the mobile app every day on my iPhone, and can either stream songs or download them to listen to when I’m offline. I don’t normally pitch products on this blog, but MOG is a service that I genuinely believe in and hope you’ll check out. When you sign up for a free trial by clicking on the button above, you also help support American Twang financially.
Once you’ve signed up for a free trial by using this link, you can listen to the playlist here.
#10. Madison Violet – No Fool For Trying
Brenley MacEachern and Lisa MacIsaac’s third full-length album doesn’t fully capture the energy of the Canadian duo’s stage show, but No Fool For Trying is still a beautifully crafted collection of bluegrassy folk and acoustic pop songs on which the singers’ exquisite voices are backed by a quartet that features acoustic guitar, banjo, fiddle and upright base–with a dash of accordion for flavor. It’s not the crispest album released this year, but No Fool For Trying is a great choice if you’re in the mood for some calm, soothing roots tunes.
Recommended tracks: “The Ransom,” “Lauralee” and “No Fool For Trying“
#9. Eilen Jewell – Butcher Holler
The better of the two Loretta Lynn tribute records released in 2010, indie artist Eilen Jewell brings a sexy jazz swagger to her delivery of these classic songs, and outstanding electric guitarist Jerry Miller fleshes them out with rockabilly-informed solos.
Recommended tracks: “This Haunted House,” “Whispering Sea” and “You Wanna Give Me A Lift.”
#8. Peter Cooper & Eric Brace – Master Sessions
This album’s title is no misnomer. Master Sessions features the musianship of Dobro icon Mike Auldridge (Seldom Scene), pedal steel legend Lloyd Green and electric guitar guru Richard Bennett, with guest vocal appearances by Julie Lee, Jon Randall and even Kenny Chesney. Top that off with Cooper and Brace—two gems of Music City in their own right—and you have a throughoughly enjoyable record. Master Sessions features a mix of covers and originals, and while the songwriting isn’t quite as sharp as that found on Cooper’s 2010 solo album (The Lloyd Green Sessions), it has a fuller and more robust sound.
Recommended tracks: “Wait A Minute,” “Silent Night” and “Behind Your Back.”
#7. Ray Wylie Hubbard – A: Enlightenment B: Endarkenment (Hint: There Is No C)
Hubbard mixes blistering slide guitar with grungy electric riffs on this raw and compelling release that draws from blues, rock, gospel and country wells. “Drunken Poet’s Dream” was written by Hayes Carll, and was named the 2010 Americana Music Association’s “Song of the Year.”
Recommended tracks: “A: Enlightenment B: Endarkenment (Hint: There Is No C),” “Drunken Poet’s Dream” and “Whoop And Hollar.”
#6. Tift Merritt – See You On The Moon
Tift Merritt is a singer-songwriter with a haunting flutter of a voice whose songwriting is poetic in the best ways, and See You On The Moon is a sensitive, thoughtful collection that manages beauty without seeming frail, airy or timid. These songs are hopeful but realistic and sung with the conviction of a woman who has something important to say to the world.
Recommended tracks: “Mixtape,” “All The Reasons We Don’t Have To Fight” and “The Things That Everybody Does.”
#5. Bobby Bare, Jr. – A Storm, A Tree, My Mother’s Head
It’s hard to go wrong with an album that includes terrifying song titles like “Your Goat Is On Fire,” “A Storm – A Tree – My Mother’s Head” and “Liz Taylor’s Lipstick Gun.” This is a somewhat bizarre record that takes a few listens to truly appreciate, but Bare is an inventive songwriter who is worth the effort.
Recommended tracks: “Rock And Roll Halloween,” “Don’t Go To Chattanooga” and “Swollen But Not The Same.”
#4. Ray LaMontagne – God Willin’ & The Creek Don’t Rise
“Beg Steal or Borrow,” which legions of listeners mistakenly believed was a Joni Mitchell song, brought folk singer LaMontagne a wealth of mainstream attention. The little single grew and grew until we were hearing it in places that folk and Americana artists seldom penetrate. In turn, LaMontagne’s reputation grew and his album became something of a celebrity fetish. Fortunately, it’s a worthy obsession.
Recommended tracks: “Beg Steal or Borrow,” “Repo Man” and “New York City’s Killing Me.“
#3. Shawn Mullins – Light You Up
Atlanta’s Shawn Mullins co-wrote Zac Brown Band’s #1 “Toes,” but his country tendencies shine brightest on Light You Up, which received a five-star review from our sister site American Noise. Mullins is a storyteller at heart, and songs like “Catoosa County,” “Can’t Remember Summer” and “The Ghost of Johnny Cash” fit firmly within the scope of modern Americana music.
Recommended tracks: “The Ghost of Johnny Cash,” “Catoosa County” and “Can’t Remember Summer.”
#2. Justin Townes Earle – Harlem River Blues
Good luck finding a more compelling folk singer alive today than Justin Townes Earle. Although he has only three albums under his belt so far, in my book he’s already eclipsed his father Steve as both a singer and a songwriter. Harlem River Blues may be jarringly less country-sounding than its predecessors, but the collection delivers more songs that will go down as some of the best of the era.
Recommended tracks: “Harlem River Blues,” “One More Night In Brooklyn” and “Christchurch Woman.”
#1. Brandon Flowers – Flamingo
It’s rare in this age of single-song downloads to find an album that contains no dispensable parts, but Brandon Flowers’ Flamingo is a masterfully cohesive and compelling record from beginning to end. Once you start listening to this rootsy yet forward-looking rock album, you won’t be able to turn it off. A special and visionary album, Flamingo was 2010’s best by leaps and bounds.
Recommended tracks: “Crossfire,” “Jilted Lovers & Broken Hearts” and “Hard Enough.”
Also read:
The 50 Best Country Songs of 2010 [American Twang]
Top 10 Country Music Albums of 2010 [American Twang]
10 Worst Country Albums of 2010 [American Twang]
The Best Country Music of 2010 [PopMatters]
The Best Country Songs of 2010 [The 9513]
Top 10 Bluegrass Albums of 2010 [The 9513]
The 10 Best Country Singles of 2010 [Country Universe]
20 Hidden Treasures of 2010 [My Kind of Country]
Dogs and Duds: The Worst Singles of 2010 [My Kind of Country]
Bucky Covington’s Top 10 Resolutions for 2011 [Farce The Music]
Top Country Songs of 2010 [The Boot]
Top Country Albums of 2010 [The Boot]
I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to disagree sharply with your top choice—which I suppose varying tastes have more to do with it than anything, but I simply found “Flamingo” an underwhelming release even on its own merit, regardless of genre.
“Flamingo” sounds largely like a collection of holdovers/B-sides from the Killers’ “Sam’s Town” era: the only Killers era I’ve been sharply critical of to date in that I feel Flowers tries too hard overreaching with his lyrical grandiosity and channeling Bruce Springsteen, but ultimately coming across as either vague or cliched on most tracks. Here, Flowers makes that same misstep. I will say the production is more diverse and intriguing than “Sam’s Town” (if still a bit banausic at times) but lyrically he still misses the mark to me (How many gambling metaphors do you really need interspersed throughout the duration?)
Flowers is most endearing when he keeps that self-importance in check and doesn’t take himself so seriously and places his eccentricities at the fore. “Day & Age” was a most listenable album because Flowers did just that. He let loose his more playful side on “Joyride” and “Neon Tiger”, while he sounded refreshed even on more pensive tracks like “Human” and “Goodnight, Travel Well”, and got away with blending both sides of him on “Spaceman” and “I Can’t Stay”. Musically it was just as colorful with the saxophones and steel drums just two instruments featured notably on multiple tracks.
Here, in contrast, he returns to that overearnestness again—and though I concede it may just be matters of personal taste again, I feel more emotionally disengaged from his delivery when there’s no nuance, nor irony, to them. Flowers is both more complete, and compelling, as an artist when he keeps that high-mindedness in check and allows his one-of-a-kind artistic personality (seriously, it’s not every day you see someone, let alone a rock star, who fears he’ll pass away on his birthday after observing the number on an Ouija board) to take the driver’s seat.
I see immense potential in him—I just see it inconsistently executed on “Flamingo” to the point it has had little staying power in my audio collection.
This is one time when I really think your analysis is off the mark, Noah. One of the major premises of your criticism is that Flowers’ music is self-important, and I’d ask you this: Isn’t that a good thing? Or, at least, can’t it be a good thing?
I am intensely bored by all of the deeply introverted music I’ve been hearing over the past few years, produced by people who doesn’t seem to have anything particularly noteworthy to say. It’s not very interesting to me to hear the mental ramblings of an average Joe who doesn’t possess a particularly insightful view of the world, and that’s why so much of the current era of music has become. Anyone can record an album now..and so anyone does, regardless of whether or not they should. You can say that Flowers’ songwriting here is “grandiose,” but I’d say that his songwriting is skillful. These aren’t just conversational phrases slapped together and set to music. These lyrics are deeply contemplated and woven together to achieve specific effects.
Maybe that makes him seem more self-important than his peers, but I consider that a good thing.
I think the great strength of this album is exactly what you cite as its big fault: it aims to be something more than just another forgettable notch in the long line of forgettable releases that bridge and artist from one release to the next.
I’m grateful that you’re making an earnest, strong case for this album, especially as a year-end favorite. We may vary widely in our enthusiasm towards the project, but that’s why I think we even bother burning through all that elbow grease and nail polish to compose these year-end retrospectives. It’s more about re-recognizing and renewing what it is that keeps our attention drawn to various forms of art than anything, and the discussion it produces is my favorite part of it.
I’m in agreement with you that there are painfully too few risk-takers in popular music that make a valiant effort to transcend the conventional mode of songwriting and arrangement, and it gets to the point where sometimes simply attempting to say or do something more impels us to give a greater deal of credit to the artist. Perhaps by default. This is where, in my view, “self-importance” is naturally a finest quality in art, though when misdirected (either by being overambitious without leaving a lasting impression, or where the pompousness of an effort overshadows the creative output itself) can also be the central flaw to any work.
Brandon Flowers is definitely a more unique songwriter than most who receive airplay on the Adult Top 40 (or Country, for that matter, even though I fail to see how this record even has country leanings). I think when he speaks from direct personal experience he can REALLY shine, and a perfect example of this in my mind is “A Dustland Fairytale” from the Killers’ most recent release. The lyrics are certainly not among the most immediate you’ll come across on the radio, but they have a cathartic emotional quality to them in that they’re biographical: speaking about his parents and observing how they communicated in their day based on his experiences with them and allowing them to share their recollections. I’ve seen footage of him performing this song since his mother passed away from cancer, and you can tell he’s fighting tears off as he does so, where certain couplets are enunciated even more emphatically than before.
Throughout much of “Flamingo”, I can’t help but feel he comes across as too pompous, and also too preachy (notably on “Playing With Fire”) too often. On “Welcome To Fabulous Las Vegas”, for instance, he relies on word arrangements that on paper surely look intriguing (i.e. “disciples hand you catalogs of concubines, as you stumble down the boulevard crying ‘Hosanna’.”) but, when you scrutinize what lies around that imagery, he employs some rather rote, stereotypical Las Vegas symbols elsewhere, and that leaves in its wake a song that surely has its share of effort put into it in at least trying to reach for something more than conference call-induced lyrical platitudes……..yet has minimal staying power because the grave likelihood is one won’t give a care about that little girl they knew from Tennessee that is surely the intended heart of the song.
Then you have songs like “On The Floor”, where Flowers speaks of the mice, rats and crickets with a heightened sense of urgency and his utterances of begging please and wanting to believe……..yet we are given no hint into what is making him tick here, nor why he has felt calm come over him in his room.
Perhaps it’s just me, but while I can surely respect an artist for overreaching regardless, sometimes the clumsiest work of all is the most unfocused, inconsistent work, regardless of how much vision, experimentation and/or ingenuity was invested in it. Simply channeling that confidence to try and go that extra mile does not automatically ensure a great album and, in fact, can even produce regrettable material. That said, all the power to the artist surely if he/she feels a positive sense of self-importance to the material.
“Flamingo” has a few shining moments in my view, including the already-mentioned “Hard Enough” with Jenny Lewis and the single “Crossfire”, but I certainly don’t see this as a Top Ten record on my end, or perhaps even a Top 100. For what it’s worth, it’s a respectable, albeit choppy, affair. I’d rate the entire rest of your Top Ten for sure above it (which I strongly agree with, and would probably list “Light You Up” as my #1)
For what it’s worth, Jim, I agree so strongly with your top choice that I wanted to stand and applaud…Brandon Flowers’ Flamingo is certainly worthy of the position you gave it and your points on his recent solo effort gave me cause to smile.
While it is important to honor individual differences of opinion I believe Noah is mistaking Brandon’s belief in himself and his songs for pompousness. What I took away from the album was music and lyrics that are dripping with earnestness and stripped of pretense. Flamingo bares a part of Brandon’s soul and how lucky as listeners we are to have a truly honest piece of work placed before us. You may hear cliches in Brandon’s work and to be sure Vegas cliches abound in this world we live in but I think beyond, underneath, and surrounding the few cliches that turn up on Flamingo there is a genuine honesty about the place that only a Vegas native can provide.
Songs like Only the Young and On The Floor have an ethereal quality about them, the lyrics posses an air of mystery and I like that Brandon trusts the intelligence of his listeners enough to feel comfortable laying down lyrics that don’t hold the hand of the listener and walk them through each step of every verse. In a time when lyrical immodesty runs rampant Brandon’s peek-a-boo glimpses of himself on tracks such as these are a breath of fresh air.
If, Noah, you are sharply critical of the Killers’ Sam’s Town era then our divergence of tastes is infinitely more clear to me…I truly loved Sam’s Town and any resemblance that Flamingo may bear to it would surely be a credit to Flamingo, in my humble opinion. You sound well-versed regarding the Killers and it’s too bad that Flamingo did not resonate more deeply with you. Luckily Jim has left us with nine other alternatives that may be worth a listen. I’ll be sure to get them just as soon as I listen to Flamingo one more time….
Trying to find the post where it was said American Twang was restructuring, but random question, is American Twang no more at this point, or will it be relaunching in the future?
Stephen,
American Twang merged with American Noise for a number of reasons. I am working on a way for AmericanTwang.com to push readers to a country-only section of this site. That should happen in a couple of weeks.
This was primarily a buisness decision, but I think it’s healthiest for both sites. We were having a hard time building audience because our readership and backlinks were split between two separate entities. Our aggregate traffic has tripled since the merge, which means that we’re making more money. Since we’re making more money, we can hire more writers and cover more music.
I really appreciate the support that you and others gave American Twang. I hope you’ll continue reading about country music here. And, like I said, that filter should be ready to go soon.
That makes sense. I understand completely the reasons behind it — as a new website, it’s hard to establish readership and a financial footprint — but was just curious as I hadn’t read anything about it.
Best of luck to you, and remember, if you want to increase traffic ten-fold, just post a negative Carrie Underwood review. ;-)
You totally missed this one:
http://bit.ly/7a9ZWG
State Champion’s – Stale Champagne
Howdy just wanted to give you a quick heads up.
The text in your post seem to be running off the screen in Safari.
I’m not sure if this is a formatting issue or something to do with browser compatibility but I figured I’d post to let you know.
The design look great though! Hope you get the issue resolved soon.
Many thanks