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Eric Church seems to straddle the line of being classified as an outlaw without ever proclaiming himself as one.<\/p>\nWhen Nashville wants you to conform, move to Texas. That\u2019s what Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson did when they were fed up with producers telling them what to do. These two 70\u2019s musicians created a tradition of creative control and musical experimentation called outlaw country. But is there a new Outlaw movement forming? Can current artists call themselves outlaws without getting backlash?<\/p>\n
Eric Church seems to straddle the line of being classified as an outlaw without ever proclaiming himself as one.<\/p>\n
He started his career by getting kicked off the Rascal Flatts tour and has been pushing the boundaries of Nashville ever since. He does his own music with controversial songs\u00a0such as \u201cTwo Pink Lines\u201d about teen pregnancy and \u201cSmoke a Little Smoke\u201d which is pro-marijuna. Clearly he doesn’t care about conformity. But is this enough to call him a true outlaw?<\/p>\n
Some people will come out and support Church as an outlaw. Darius Rucker believes that Church is a bad boy and \u201cthe closest we got to Waylon and Willie.\u201d<\/a> Brad Paisley, at the 2011 CMA awards, called Eric \u201ccountry\u2019s latest Outlaw\u201d when introducing his performance. But according to Church, it is a word that gets \u201cmisused<\/a>\u201d a lot. He respects the term used for the 70\u2019s and thinks it fits for those artists but \u201cis now used just because people are unsure how to identify an artist.\u201d He hates genres and claims that he doesn’t want to be branded for the type of music that he plays.<\/p>\n Me at an Eric Church concert in 2014<\/p><\/div>\n Personally I think his view, and most other peoples view, of his music can be summed up by his song \u201cOutsiders.<\/a>\u201d First off, the title is a great substitute for the word outlaw. He can use this word to describe himself as different without using the controversial term to avoid backlash. Secondly, in the lyrics he refers to his rock and roll sound with the phrase, \u201cwide open rocking, that\u2019s how we roll.\u201d Church will always admit to having a rock influence. His song \u201cSpringsteen\u201d being a great example of this. Lastly, he creates this line between the in crowd and out crowd. He isn\u2019t part of the in crowd and doesn’t want to be, but is going to stand up and show that he his music has a lot to offer.<\/p>\n There are so many different sub genres of country today that it is sometimes hard to categorize an artist into one place. It is also hard not to offend people when trying to do so. In my opinion there will never be another Willie or Waylon, but I do think that there are artists who can and will come close. Eric Church is just one of many who are still trying to fight the \u201cNashville Sound\u201d while trying to make music that people will listen to.<\/p>\n \u201cDon’t ever try and be like anybody else and don’t be afraid to take risks.\u201d -Waylon Jennings<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" When Nashville wants you to conform, move to Texas. That\u2019s what Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson did when they were fed up with producers telling them what to do. These two 70\u2019s musicians created a tradition of creative control and … Continue reading ![\"\"](\"http:\/\/sites.dwrl.utexas.edu\/countrymusic\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/19\/2015\/09\/IMG_8064-169x300.jpg\")
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