Hidden country: the secret family tree of country music - Culture and Reviews - Book Review

Reason, Oct, 2002 by Damon W. Root

By both banking on his famous name and drastically altering his father's formula, Hank Williams Jr. has expanded both the definition and fan base of country music. Party-loving Southern rockers and old-fashioned fiddlers now have an equal stake in the enterprise. "As a Williams," Ching argues, "Bocephus can make definitive statements about the meaning of country music itself, [and] he can make it mean nearly anything he wants."

Judging by the recent success of both traditional bluegrass (the soundtrack to O Brother Where Art Thou?) and country-pop (Garth Brooks, Faith Hill), Bocephus isn't the only one who can make country mean whatever he wants it to. From Emmett Miller and the dying embers of minstrelsy to the commercial explosion of Hank Williams and his vast influence on both country and the birth of rock 'n' roll, these books help explain how cultural forms migrate, mix, and recombine, often in invisible and unpredictable ways.

Ironically, today's country music is largely seen as a refuge for whites from so-called black music, in spite of country's roots in minstrelsy and deep ties with the blues. Nashville's reputation as a bastion of family values is equally strange, given Johnny Cash's murder songs ("I shot a man in Reno, just to watch him die") and the alcohol-fueled antics of George "No Show" Jones.

Ultimately, however, these interpretations will themselves give way to others, further expanding the wealth of identities and affiliations available on the American scene. From Christian fundamentalists to longhaired freaks, cowpunks to good ol' boys, every new face makes country bigger than it was before. And there is always room for more unexpected arrivals.

Damon W. Root (d_w_r@hotmail.com) is a writer in New York City.

DAMON ROOT, who traces the rich, varied, and wonderfully tangled roots of country music in "Hidden Country" followed his own circuitous journey to the much-maligned genre. "It all started with the rappers Run-DMC," he says, launching into a list of groups that winds up with the Orange County punk band Social Distortion. "They did a great cover of Johnny Cash," he explains. Root was raised in Tampa, Florida, but moved to New York to attend Columbia University and grab a front-row seat for the city's hardcore punk scene. He is researching a book on that topic while working as a writer and editor of music catalogs for Columbia House, the mall order CD club.