How Big Is Country Music in Sacramento? (Bakersfield, Modesto: crimes, school)

[smoking357]

Is it the predominant music heard in stores and restaurants?

Is it considered cool and expected to have Country playing?

Is the average person likely to have Country playing on his or her car radio?

[CityGirl72]

Thankfully it's not.

It used to be 15 years ago - but it's died down. Yes some people listen to it, and yes, I still have some friends who love it. But I hardly hear it around much anymore. Maybe if you go out towards more of the hilly areas

[edwardius]

Its been replaced by Bandera and Ranchero music. There was a time when the country music was big enough in California to produce its own genre. Back in the 1950's, Merle Haggard and Buck Owens were introduced the Bakersfield Sound to the world.

Bakersfield sound - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

But that was from a period when you had lots of Okie's who fled the dustbowl and came to work as agricultural labor in the central valley. Now most of the farm workers in California are hispanic. So the music of rural areas tends to be hispanic too.

For a while Sacramento had about 6 country radio stations and now I think its down to about 2. The new country stations tended to not play the older established country artists like Johnny Cash, Merle Haggard, Willie Nelson and when they dropped those artists from the play list, they lost a lot of the older part of their audience. The advertisers were interested mostly in the younger audience, but as I said before the rural areas that tend to nurture country music in California tend to be hispanic and that has resulted in a much smaller base audience for new country music in California.

I myself never really cared for new country. But I really do love listening to Patsy Cline and Hank Williams Jr.

[wburg]

15 years ago? Maybe 50 years ago, when Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys were around, and Wills Point was the place to go--but even then, just as many people went for the black jazz clubs in the now-demolished West End.

Sacramento is more of a rock & roll town, and has been for a long time. The Okies and their kids may have liked country, but their grandkids grew up on Led Zeppelin, Iron Maiden and Korn--or, more locally, the Blue Cheer, Tesla, the Deftones and Papa Roach. You find plenty of country in the outer suburbs, nearer to areas that are still rural or semi-rural (at least until the latest crop of suburbs came in.) There is also an active hip-hop community that is pretty well known.

In the city of Sacramento, no, you're not likely to find a whole lot of country being played. There are a few local bands that play sounds that hail back to Western swing, like the Alkali Flats or Boulevard Park, but they are just one of many subgenres.

[smoking357]

Thanks for the responses, folks. I am so glad to hear that Sacramento doesn't share the musical tastes of America's Southeast. Buck and Merle were cool, so was Dwight, and I do like the Mavericks, but that treacly, jingoistic, nursery-rhyme, lowbrow, war-whoop dreck that passes for Country, today, really turns my stomach, and I can't believe that any person would be so bereft of culture or taste to listen to it.

Among a long bill of sonic crimes, they actually have a song that proudly and seriously claims that there's no separation of church and state. I looked it up. It's by Diamond Rio.

Country is outright pandering to Bible Belters and Republicans, and it's completely without aesthetic merit.

[CityGirl72]

Well I was thinking of that 90s thing were Country Music dance clubs were opening up and the "it" thing was allt he new country music coming out (which doesn't sound country at all)

What was the place on Arden again? Dang I can't believe I forgot that country dance place name? IN Cahouts? It was like the "It" spot for white 30/40-somethings

[edwardius]

Wburg,

I wouldn't mistake your taste for the taste of the region.

Right now the Wrangler Bar is full time country club.

TheWranglerBar.com

Whisky Wild is doing country a couple of nights a week.

Whiskey WILD Saloon - Sacramento, CA

You have the occasional live country act playing at Old Ironsides, The Bluelamp and at the Palm's out in Winters.

Wilhelmina's was playing country several nights a week until two or three years ago.

The original El Dorado Saloon out in Carmichael got its start as a Country Western venue and still had several nights dedicated to country when it lost its liquor license back in 2004. I imagine the new El Dorado Saloon will work the same way.

El Dorado Saloon - El Dorado Hills, CA 95762

[wburg]

d_deathrage: I certainly wouldn't mistake my taste for the taste of the region, but what I listed above isn't my taste in music.

Anyhow, we're not talking about the region, but about the city of Sacramento. If you get out into the region, you certainly get a lot of country fans, like way out on Grant Line Road at the Wrangler Bar in Elk Grove.

Is the El Dorado Saloon in El Dorado Hills actually connected to the Eldo in Carmichael, other than the name? The Eldo I remember had country bands but was best-known as a rock club.

Whiskey Wild isn't doing ANYTHING any nights of the week--they went out of business last year. Didn't last long, neither did a strictly country theme--just before they went out of business, their big draw was televised mixed martial arts nights.

Willemina's seemed like it was trying to be a rockabilly bar, they had some retro-country acts as well as rockabilly/psychobilly, punk and gothic/industrial nights, but they went out of business too. The current club in the same spot is Necropolis, they put on metal shows, industrial clubs, steampunk, and assorted DJ dance nights.

I'm not trying to suggest that there is no country in Sacramento--there is a thriving subgenre of retro-country in the local music scene, but a lot of the people in bands like the Alkali Flats, Boulevard Park, the Hell-Outs, the Spillit Quikkers, etcetera are old punks or veterans of the local rock scene, or involved with the local "Americana" folk scene (folks like Christian Kiefer.) There's a lot of rockabilly in Sacramento, and those folks generally listen to some country. And I'd wager about half the hipsters in Sacramento have some Patsy Cline, Bob Wills, Johnny Cash or other old-school country in their record collection. But, really, it is one genre of a very diverse local music scene, not the predominant form or even close to it.

Not to mention that I'm sure a couple of the local gay bars, like the Depot and the Mercantile, have country nights. But I'd bet the song the OP mentioned above is not a favorite of their DJ playlists.

But, in any case, it's not necessarily the kind of place where the kind of country fan the OP is talking about, fans of contemporary country, is likely to be found in large quantity. It is not often heard in Sacramento's stores and restaurants, or playing in people's car radios.

Out in the surrounding communities, that's another story--lots of country fans to be found in places around Sacramento. But, as is often the case, talking about the city of Sacramento and talking about places around it are two very, very different things.

CityGirl: Okay, you're talking about the early 90s country music fad...yeah, it comes back every 15 years ago, as do most musical genres.

[edwardius]

Wburg never admits he is wrong. Instead he just gets more and more defensive.

[KC6ZLV]

If you want to get an idea of what people are listening to Arbitron's ratings is one place to start.

Arbitron PPM Ratings Data (http://www.arbitron.com/home/ppm_data.htm - broken link)

Sacramento has never been big on country music. In the distant past there were a few lower-power AM stations which were "country," but not in the sense of a distinct genre as you would think of it today. I think there was one AM country station during most of the 80s and one FM station. At some point two FM country stations appeared, but the local market hasn't supported more than one country station for any length of time.

There are a few country stations for the rural areas between Sacramento and Redding, but with kind of a watered-down country format with throws in stuff that is kind of that easy-listening light rock crap that kinda-sorta sounds like country music.

In California, Country is big from Modesto to Bakersfield and out in the Mojave area. It is also popular in Monterey County, which is kind of like a cultural extension of the San Joaquin Valley.