Best Songs of 2019 Spotlight / Vandoliers / "16 Years"

From the “Songs of the Year Dept.” Jason Hawk Harris

By Kevin Broughton

Jason Hawk Harris, “Grandfather”

From his Bloodshot Records* debut, Love and The Dark, a heavenly ode full of honest questions from Jason Hawk Harris. The studio version is grand and sweeping, but we choose an acoustic take here to demonstrate why he’s one of two folks in our top 10 with Isbell-esque chops and potential.

And if we did a top 10 for songwriting, he’d be the all-around champ.

*It’s been another good year for the misfits at Bloodshot Records.

The Current Poop of Mainstream Country Radio: December '19

The current Poop Rating of the Mediabase Top 20 is (-19) overall which is a 8(!!) point decrease from October (the previous time we did this chart). The best song on the chart is Jon Pardi’s “Heartache Medication.”  The worst is Dan + Shay and Justin Bieber’s “10,000 Hours.”

Chart info from Mediabase/Country Aircheck.

Mitchell Tenpenny is on Jesus' Naughty List

Santa Requests Voice Messages in Lieu of Letters from Kane Brown Fans

Kris Kringle, aka Santa Claus, usually stays out of the public eye, rarely granting interviews or making public statements. Sure, his legion of helpers is out in force this time of year, taking Christmas requests in mall courtyards and smiling with crying kids on their laps, but the man himself is busy and reclusive. Therefore, his press release this year came as quite a surprise. 

We won’t post the release, but the gist of it was Santa asking Kane Brown fans to leave a voice mail of their Christmas desires rather than send letters this year. His message was direct but polite, never giving the specific reasoning behind his request, only that “these old eyes have a little trouble reading your writing.”

However, we’ve received word from an inside source that Santa’s missive was related to the undecipherable nature of the letters he received from members of the fanbase in recent years. “They looked like they were written by cavemen,” said an anonymous North Pole worker who asked us to refer to him as Toony. “Santa was all understanding and diplomatic like some fat Mr. Rogers, but I’m just gonna say those people are stupid as hell.”

Toony sent a jpeg of one letter that started “Deer Satan” written in hunting face-paint on a paper towel. Though the rest of the note was difficult to translate, it appeared the young man wanted either the game Modern Warfare or something to do with ‘model whores.’ Either request seems just as likely.

“Last year we just gave them all non-gender specific clothing and gift cards to save time because 90% of them were just scribbles and gibberish,” said Toony. “And a surprising amount of them came from prisons, or maybe not that surprising now that I’m thinking about it.”

Toony told us the voice messaging option was going fairly well so far, mostly thanks to technology. An AI listening system has been installed to take the calls and is doing an impressive job translating the yawps and grunts of the Kane Brown fans into gift requests, but he says the letters are still a running joke at Santa’s toy shop, passed around frequently by the elves. 

“One of them was clearly written in sidewalk chalk on the inside of a Playboy magazine cover,” laughed Toony. “It was obviously smeared beyond readability, but I did make out something about ‘booty shorts’…ho ho ho indeed.”