guess i need to find that Alabama disc...

I'm not a huge country music fan. There have been songs I like, like Alabama's "I'm in a Hurry to Get Things Done", and a few others. There's also some painful ones, too, but that goes for almost any music out there. In fact, some types are almost nothing but painful.

But I give it kudos for ticking off the right people.

Country Music: Too Much Freedom-Loving?

The Post music critic going by the name Josh Freedom du Lac – that just can’t be his name – doesn’t really seem to like patriotic music, despite the patriotic byline. He worries that songs like Jason Aldean’s “Hicktown” or the Zac Brown Band’s “Chicken Fried” do something wrong: They are “narrowcasting to a specific community: the core country audience, whose roots aren't exactly in America's urban centers.”

That claim in itself sounds silly. Aren’t people who make rap music or big-band music or polka music “narrowcasting?” Maybe du Lac just doesn’t like this particular niche audience. He doesn’t like the message that’s offered, either.

“The symbolism and prideful sentiments of the songs are intended to create a sense of belonging among people with similar backgrounds and lifestyles, or at least people who romanticize life in the rural South,” he wrote. “To some listeners, though, it might sound as if the artists are closing ranks.”

As the writer later shows, du Lac likes groups like the Dixie Chicks and The Coup; you know, the anti-patriotic and anti-American kinds of music groups.

So, maybe it's time I started re-learning the Electric Slide.