Over the past year or two I’ve been listening to more and more country music. I particularly like the older, classic stuff and I do like a lot of the new stuff, but I must say … I hate Rascal Flatts. They sound like an adult contemporary Christian group, minus the Chrisitian. Is it any coincidence that the CCM group Selah covered their hit, Bless The Broken Road? I liken Rascal Flatts to 4Him, or a male version of Point of Grace. Musically, the songs are produced to perfection — removing any amount of life out of them.

I admit I don’t know much about their entire body of work but from what I’ve heard on the radio, there just seems to be a disconnect between the artist and the music. Take the song Me and My Gang for example. I have a hard time listening to middle aged guys with hip haircuts that sound like they drive their 3.5 kids and golden retriever around in the minivan singing about being in a motorcycle gang — especially when they break into a delightful chorus of “Na, Na, Na’s” at the end of the song. Maybe it’s just me, but that doesn’t seem very motorcycle gangly to me. I picture a video with a group of bikers doing some kind of choreographed boy-band thing.

And then there is the remake of “Life Is A Highway.” It just sounds like a lifeless, adult contemporary cover of Tom Cochran’s 1991 one hit wonder. My question is, does it even qualify as country music at all? I don’t think so as you could just as easily hear this song on any adult contemporary station and it contains no distictly country elements in the arrangement.

Oh, and Schultz says they can’t keep pitch in concert. Here ends my musical rant.