Country Corral

Aug 22

Cheri NobelThe Playground Brooks & Dunn, Love and Theft, Music, Taylor Swift 4 Comments

Taylor Swift

When Taylor Swift first burst onto the country music scene as a 16 year old in 2006 she appeared, at first glance, to be nothing more than the latest in a string of young girls trying to make a name for themselves in country music, following the path of LeeAnn Rimes and Jessica Andrews. Her first song, Tim McGraw, peaked at #6 on the country charts. I can still remember an early radio interview when she explained that the song referred to a fascination with the Tim McGraw song, rather than Mr. McGraw himself (so that Tim wouldn’t see her as a stalker).

Taylor’s self-titled debut album has sold three million copies, and had five singles crack the country top 10, including #1 hits Our Song (my personal favorite from the album) and Picture to Burn.

Taylor’s second album, Fearless, hit shelves in November 2008 and became the first million selling album of 2009. Three singles have been released from that album – Love Story, White Horse, and You Belong to Me. Of those three singles, my favorite is probably White Horse – the only one of the three that hasn’t hit #1 on the country chart (it peaked at #2).

The cool thing about Taylor is that she is not just a singer. She is also a writer. She won a national poetry contest in fourth grade, and writes many of her own songs. She also seems to be a very fun loving person, and shares interesting details about her life and career through her Facebook page (as opposed to some stars who just use it to tell people when their new perfume is hitting store shelves).

Taylor has been in the media a lot, so it’s difficult to imagine that too many people are unaware of her – but if you’re one of the people who have been hiding under a rock, grab one of her albums and give it a listen. Guys – now that she broke up with the Jonas brother, she’s single again!

Runaway

Sometimes a song gets lodged in your brain and you just can’t get it out. Lately, the song that keeps running through my head is Runaway by the new group Love and Theft. I wasn’t aware of it at the time, but the group actually has a tie to Taylor Swift – as an opening act for her Fearless tour. In additional, group member Stephen Barker Liles is the subject of Swift’s song, Hey Stephen. Love and Theft’s debut album, World Wide Open, will be released on August 26.

Brooks & Dunn

Sometimes, it’s just time to hang it up. Country duo Brooks & Dunn are calling it quits. After nearly twenty incredibly successful years together, they have announced the end of their career – at least as a group. They will release the album #1s and Then Some on September 8th and will tour one last time in 2010. It’s been a good ride, guys – thanks for all the memories.