Yeah, people who buy Mumford & Sons records are going to buy Dave Matthews Band records or Coldplay records or the Lumineers or U2 or whatever. No one's going to buy Bonnie Raitt or John Fullbright's record because Mumford & Sons won album of the year.
There's a whole slew of pop music that's positioning itself as Americana, & it's far worse than it is good. Taylor Swift soaking up all of the country music exposure is not ultimately good for an artist like Jamey Johnson. That kind of homogenization--the appeal to the lowest common denominator--is terrible for the people who want authentic americana or country music. These acts aren't "gateway" artists, there's not enough (or any) authentic americana or country in them to actually segue into the authentic acts. This is the "countrypolitanization" of Americana. But it's not even that, because it's so far from Americana. It's just a bunch of people agreeing to call it Americana because they wear suspenders & play a banjo.
Drives me nuts.
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