The James Barker Band's worldwide appeal garnered them a nomination from the Country Music Association for "Global Country Artist of the Year," but the Juno Award winners' new EP inhibits their musical progress with a lot of the same mediocre bro-country drivel.
Their hit, "Good Together," is an upbeat and carefree "love song" that shares similar lyrics with "She's A Hit" and "Want You In It." The only difference between these three songs is their tempo. None of these "love songs" are about real love, but embody superficial, unnatural and pompous clichès that personify Florida Georgia Line's "Cruise," with the windows down and a girl in the front seat of a car, which Maddie and Tae already dispelled, in 2015, with their hit, "Girl In A Country Song."
The familiar country-pop melody on "If It Weren't for Girls" is a crass version of Dierks Bentley's "Different for Girls" that alternatively glorifies gender stereotypes and misogyny that is distressing to hear and painfully unpleasant to stomach.
It is time to move forward from artificial, manufactured and carbon copy songwriting and focus on what country music stands for: the real thing. At this moment, country music fans deserve more from humanity than the James Barker Band has to offer.
(Universal)Their hit, "Good Together," is an upbeat and carefree "love song" that shares similar lyrics with "She's A Hit" and "Want You In It." The only difference between these three songs is their tempo. None of these "love songs" are about real love, but embody superficial, unnatural and pompous clichès that personify Florida Georgia Line's "Cruise," with the windows down and a girl in the front seat of a car, which Maddie and Tae already dispelled, in 2015, with their hit, "Girl In A Country Song."
The familiar country-pop melody on "If It Weren't for Girls" is a crass version of Dierks Bentley's "Different for Girls" that alternatively glorifies gender stereotypes and misogyny that is distressing to hear and painfully unpleasant to stomach.
It is time to move forward from artificial, manufactured and carbon copy songwriting and focus on what country music stands for: the real thing. At this moment, country music fans deserve more from humanity than the James Barker Band has to offer.
