Queens of Royalty, Rock & Raunch - Queen Elizabeth II, Taylor Swift & Miley Cyrus

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What do they have in common?  Other than a few hundred million dollars in net worth not much.  But it is fun to look at these three Queens when they were the same age.

Hannah Montana - Disney look

Miley Cyrus

For example, Miley Cyrus is now 21 years old and she grossed an estimated $78 million in the last year, and that wasn't all she grossed as she grossed out her fans with her free wheeling lifestyle based on getting stoned, getting drunk and getting wild.

Miley is the reincarnation of Madonna as a wild child and Cyrus intends to celebrate herself, her money, her sexuality and whatever else comes along with no interest in being apologetic or anything mature.

Actually Miley started out as a Disney do gooder, the All American teen, before she grew up and decided being provocative paid.  In 2006 at age 14 thanks to Disney Cyrus had an estimated net worth of $3.5 million.

Today it has grown to about $155 million net worth thanks to her on-stage antics, a lot of skin and a tongue that seems to drag on the floor.

    

When Queen Elizabeth was the same age, 21, she had just survived four years of Nazi bombings of London and had been a member of the British Women's Auxiliary Territorial Service.

Elizabeth age 3

On her 21st birthday, the same age as Cyrus today, she was traveling through Africa with her parents and made a radio broadcast back to Britain pledging:

"I declare before you all that my whole life, whether it be long or short, shall be devoted to your service and the service of our great imperial family to which we all belong."

Taylor Swift

Taylor is the heir apparent as Queen of Country music and has not fallen into the same pit of vulgarity and sexuality as Miley though they seem to be friends of some sort.

Swift made her breakthrough at age 16 with her first mega hit "Tim McGraw" and has created a multi-million dollar niche chronicling the life of a typical teen through her music, making her the greatest crossover artist ever from country to pop.

Of course most typical teens didn't earn $18 million by their 18th birthday nor generate about $50 million each the past few years touring while releasing one new album every two years.

Today Taylor continues to earn entertainer of the year awards for her relentless touring schedule, fan availability and All-American image.  At age 25 she is worth an estimated $220 million and has at least four estates worth millions each across the nation.

While Cyrus slithers on her tongue for the fans Taylor hobnobs with American royalty like the Kennedy family boys at her New England estate.  The crazier Miley gets the swifter Swift sets herself apart from her crazy friend.

So what was Queen Elizabeth up to when she was 25 like Taylor?  She was getting married and just two years later, at age 27, she became Queen of England and all the other territories associated with the British crown.

Okay, so how much is the British monarch worth compared to the American kids?  Well, contrary to reports the royal family overspends, the Queen is personally worth about $500 million.  Her properties alone generate about $79 million dollars per year, about what they cost to operate a year.

And her net worth does not count the Crown Estate trust for the British royalty consisting of real estate property, art work and other stuff worth BILLIONS of pounds, dollars, any way you want to count it, way more than 15 billions of dollars.

Soooo...

Before reaching the age of 21 Miley Cyrus was a multi-millionaire Disney television star and Taylor Swift was a multi-millionaire heart beat and heart throb of country and pop music. At the same age Queen Elizabeth was dodging Nazi bombs that were destroying London having refused to leave England and demanding to stay with her parents, the King and Queen.

At age 21 Miley Cyrus slithers on her tongue while Queen Elizabeth pledged her loyalty to the people of Britain and at age 25 Taylor Swift travels the world singing and buying mansions while Queen Elizabeth was getting married and two years away from becoming Queen of Britain.

Today Queen Elizabeth is closing in on becoming the longest reigning monarch in British history, yes for all time, as she will pass her great, great grandmother Queen Victoria and her 63 year 216 day continuous reign record in less than 500 days.

Ah the trials and tribulations of royalty British or American style.

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If Taylor Swift fell in Love, got married & lived happily ever after, would her songwriting end?

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America's most popular teenager, even at age 23, has created a phenomenal music machine in the six short years since she exploded on the scene.  A singing and songwriting prodigy if ever there was one, Taylor took about the hardest path possible in her "swift" ascent foregoing the huge Nashville record labels and opting for an independent label, Big Machine Records.

 

Though her label was just a start up it had a solid platinum 16 year old in young Taylor Swift.  She probably does not remember but I exchanged several emails with her before she had the record deal and was famous, and interestingly enough we discussed what she would have to give up to sign with a major label.

 

 

At the time she insisted she would never sign with a major label because she intended to write and perform her own songs and they would never let her at her young age.  She was far wiser than her years.

 

Today, six years later, she has sold over 26 million albums and over 75 million digital downloads worldwide and Forbes magazine says the 23 year old is now worth over $220 million.  So far in 2013 her income this year exceeds $55 million.

 

 

She has a penthouse in midtown Nashville, Tennessee, a cottage in Beverly Hills, California and an eight bedroom vacation home in coastal Watch Hill, Rhode Island.

 

She recently made several hundred thousand dollars profit selling a million dollar mansion she bought in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts next door to the most famous political royalty in America, the Kennedy family.  She bought it to be close to one of the Kennedy boys she was dating.

 

 

And that brings us to the subject of this story.  Taylor Swift sells millions of records to teens telling the tragic stories of her lost loves of life, what she acknowledges is the source of her often heartbreaking compositions.

 

Since becoming a super star her romances read like a celebrity whose who and have made extremely good material for the tearful tales she tells in song.  Just look at this partial list from Swiftipedia of the more public mates she has dated.

 

 

The song Tim McGraw was inspired by an ex-boyfriend named Brandon Borello. Their relationship ended because he had to go to college. She told USA today, "He bought the album and said he really loved it, which is sweet. His current girlfriend isn't too pleased with it, though." It was named after a musician whose songs she liked. He was going away to college so she wanted to write him something to remember her by.

 

Picture to Burn was written about an ex-boyfriend, whom she calls a redneck, and says he never let her drive his pick-up truck.

 

Teardrops on My Guitar was written about a boy she liked, whom she never actually dated. "Drew was a real person!" she tells. Drew was surprised when he heard his name in the song. "I never knew she liked me" Drew says. Taylor stated that two years after the song came out Drew showed up at her house and asked her on a date. She declined. "It was the perfect fairytale ending but a little too late."

 

 Should've Said No was about an ex-boyfriend that cheated on her. The boyfriend's name was Sam Armstrong, and, in the CD booklet, every S, A, and M was capitalized if it was in the correct order.

 

Joe Jonas broke up with her over the phone, which is something she has complained about on Ellen Degeneres' show and elsewhere. She got her record company to let her record a song about it, to add at the last minute to her album. Forever & Always is the name of that song. She also wrote 'Last Kiss' about him and 'Better than Revenge' is about his ex-girlfriend, Camila Belle.

 

 

Taylor Lautner became her boyfriend after they met on set for the film Valentine's Day. Their relationship was popularly known as Taylor Squared. They broke up in early 2010. She mentioned going to a hockey game with him during her October 29th 2009 appearance on the Ellen Show.

 

According to MTV he was more into her than she was into him, he going everywhere he could to see her, but it was not working out. They have apparently decided to just be friends.  The song, Back to December is suspected to be about Taylor Lautner. The song is an apology to him.

 

Some of the lyrics go..." Your guard is up and I know why. Because the last time you saw me is still burned in the back of your mind ...you gave me roses and I left them there to die. So this is me swallowing my pride, standing in front of you saying I'm sorry for that night. And I go back to December all the time. You gave me all your love and all I gave you was goodbye."

 

 

At the end of the song she asks for his forgiveness and hints to the fact she wants to be with him again. The couple hasn't reunited and at the recent American Music Awards Swift performed the song and at the end added "and he said it's too late to 'pologize" from popular song "Apologize" by the band One Republic. She is alluding to the parody video Taylor Lautner made for "Apologize".  Time magazine listed this is one of the top apologies of 2010.

 

Jake Gyllenhaal reported spent $160,000 to have her flown over on a private jet for a date. He later broke up with her through text. We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together, State of Grace, All Too Well, Girl at Home and The Moment I Knew are rumored to be about him.

 

The songs Dear John and I Knew You Were Trouble are rumored to be about her ex-boyfriend John Mayer, whom she had a fling with at one time.

 

 

The song Enchanted is about Adam Young of Owl City but she never dated him, although he did state his interest in her.

 

Former beaus Harry Styles and Connor Kennedy are yet to be immortalized in Taylor's songs.

 

So, if Taylor were to fall in love, get married and live happily ever after would that signal the end of her songwriting and recording career?  What is a country queen, or should we say princess, to do with no new material for songs?

 

How could the hundreds of millions of teenagers around the world in love with Taylor and her music handle a happy married Taylor?  Feeling good, sharing happiness and being content are very un-teen like in this day and age.

 

How in the world will the big pharmaceutical companies keep making their insane profits if kids aren't depressed like their parents?  Nearly 50% of all Americans are now on prescription drugs for depression.

 

At the same time, can Taylor make the transition and actually write happy songs that teens will buy?  It would be yet another first in the bonnet of this young woman who shattered all kinds of glass ceilings in the country music and record industries doing things her way.

 

Let us hope teens today will not hold candle light vigils pleading with Taylor to "dump the chumps" so she can keep on writing country hits.

 

 

I say Taylor has given us an incredible slice of her life to share the intimacy of her relationships through her music.  She deserves to be happy too.

 

What do you say?

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Grammy Awards - A Night with the Stars

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Tinsel town really is into award shows and the 2012 Grammy Show was no exception.  The untimely death of Whitney Houston on the eve of the Grammy Show certainly gave the show more interest and hype along with the production difficulty of last minute changes to a very extensive production.

The awards themselves had few surprises led by Adele, the 23-year-old British soul phenom who swept all six categories she was nominated for, including album of the year for her sophomore smash “21.

The worst performance of the night, and there were several, came from the train wreck that was Nicki Minaj.  Nicki was attempting to do a Lady Gaga inspired performance but it was little more than poor taste, art at its most twisted and misguided.  From her parody of "The Exorcist" to a weird hip-hop take on "O Come, All Ye Faithful", her performance led the worst of the worst.

Adele provided the soul of the show.  For those of you not familiar with her, she is the sassy Brit who was first discovered on MySpace when a friend posted a demo of her performing.  At the 2009 Grammy Awards, Adele received the awards for Best New Artist and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance.

Last night she added six more Grammy awards to her collection sweeping album and song of the year.  Her gutsy performance was a result of the loss of her voice last year, cancelling of her world tour, and laser surgery on her throat.  This was her comeback performance and she brought the house down.

One of few superstars who is a bit over weight in appearance, a bit cockney in her English accent, a bit salty with her language, and a bit frumpy with her image, she is a refreshing change from the studio manufactured cute, skinny, sexy, mindless personas one expects.

For someone of my generation it was seemingly surreal when the line up of performers included Bruce Springsteen, Paul McCartney, the Beach Boys and Glen Campbell among other blasts from the past.  The fact they still dominate shows after all these years shows their staying power, and maybe the sorry state of song writing currently dragging down the industry.

Whenever there is a drop in music sales it is always blamed on the economy or pirates when it should be blamed on the lack of quality songs, lack of new artists that can sing, and lack of new songs that are written well meaning they actually tell a story.  The vast majority of performances last night had endless repetition, minimum lyrics, and less than stellar performances.

The few references to Whitney Houston and ballet sung by Jennifer Hudson were in quite good taste but there was an underlying tragic nature underpinning the show.  You had a tribute to Glen Campbell because he has Alzheimer disease.  A tribute to the Beach Boys whose Brian Wilson is another brilliant mind shattered by the reality of the music business.

Then there was the tribute to Adela who is coming back from throat surgery caused by her record label sending her on the road doing 200 shows a year.  It seems many of the new artists are treated like commodities and pushed until they break down.

Taylor Swift - Country Super Star

Finally there was the tribute to Whitney.  More than anything Whitney represents the real failure of the music industry to protect those who have so much to offer.  Ever since her descent into the dark side with Bobby Brown who took her from the light in the church choir to the darkness in the urban underworld of drugs and alcohol, she has been abandoned by many in the music industry.

Her death is a testament to the indifference often seen as we watch stars disintegrate in the tabloids.  Where was all the love shown last night when Whitney was alive and needed help?  No, there is something very hypocritical about the music industry and the way it can ignore those who helped bring the industry it's popularity, success, and yes, bottom line profit.

If you really care about your artists then save them when they are alive, don't just honor them when they are dead.

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2010 Grammy Round up - A Wall of Sound

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Just watched the Grammy awards and saw Beyonce win six (most by a female at one show in history) and Taylor Swift win four awards (including youngest female to ever win album of the year). It was a weird night with some pretty good performances. My favorites were Lady Gaga and Elton John, Pink sailing above the crowd in a quite pleasing performance, Green Day with the Cast of a new Musical performing their song 21 Guns, and Bon Jovi from New Jersey proving that the Jersey talent continues to run deep.



Perhaps the reason album sales in America have collapsed the last decade is because so many songs are so over-produced they simply engulf the listener in a wall of sound that makes the words impossible to understand and the instrumental mix a clutter of competing sounds. Maybe the lyrics are over-powered by the music because the story line is inferior. Crisp lyrics, strong arrangements, diverse orchestration and a mix that made you appreciate each of these factors made music much more enjoyable in the past.



In 2000 there were 785 million albums sold in America. In 2009 there were just 374 million sold, a loss of over 52% in record sales during the decade. Record labels say it is because of the Internet and theft from downloading but I believe it is because the record buying public thinks so much material is terrible they won't waste their money.



Back to the Grammy awards, the worst performance was by Taylor Swift, whose album Fearless was named Best Album of the Year. Her duet with Stevie Nicks was hard to listen to as the young pop princess again proved singing live is her Achilles heel. Don't take it from me, here is what the expert critics said.



Los Angeles Times - Ann Powers

The most telling statement of the night, in fact, came from comic Stephen Colbert, who told the crowd that the Grammys were "the highest honor that the music industry can bestow, other than your song being covered by the cast of 'Glee,' " the popular TV show about a high school choir. Today's most powerful songs often reach listeners as ads -- the specialty of the Peas -- in YouTube video tributes, as with Beyonce's "Single Ladies," which won song of the year, or in other "nonmusical" contexts.



And more than ever, today's biggest stars are those who embody powerful archetypes so well that a misplaced note or two may be kindly overlooked.
That last situation applies to Taylor Swift, who continued her winning streak by taking home album of the year for "Fearless," a recording that has seemingly won every available prize in the last year. Swift, 20, is a songwriter; she thanked her record label for "letting me write every song on my album" while accepting one of her awards.

But as well-crafted as her platinum-selling tales of suburban high school life are, it's Swift's persona that really sells. This smart young woman comes across as a perky, living American Girl doll, and that appealing version of traditional young womanhood, not her music, is at the heart of her stardom.

Her singing certainly can't be credited. Appealing enough on record, it always seems to let her down live. Swift gave a strikingly bad vocal performance at Staples Center on Sunday, sounding tinny and rhythmically flat-footed as she shared the microphone with the distinctive Stevie Nicks. Swift's inability to match or support Nicks as they worked through a medley of each woman's hits stood in stark contrast to the evening's other pairings, particularly soul man Maxwell's sensitive response to Roberta Flack and Lady Gaga's bravado turn with Elton John.



The Envelope - Randy Lewis

Beyoncé and Swift's combined 10 awards honored recordings that sold in numbers last year that defied the beleaguered music industry's downward trend in recent years, saluting broad-based success at a particularly difficult time in the record business.

"For me, genres have really become something that I don't think people focus on anymore," Swift said backstage. "Country music is my love. [But] when you're making music, I think the healthiest thing to do is remove titles or stereotypes from what you're trying to do. It's not country versus rap . . . it's not anything you don't make it. It's about trying to make an album you hope is good enough to win album of the year."

MLive.com - Jessica Nunez

Taylor Swift with Stevie Nicks
Poor Stevie Nicks. She's long proved herself in the music world and delivered once again last night on a trio of Taylor Swift songs. But Swift, who won four Grammys including Album of the Year, proved once again that the stage is not her friend. Nicks' raspy voice combined with Swift's pitchy performance was almost cringe-worthy. Taylor Swift is cute and her songs are catchy, but it's just plain hard to watch her live.



Green Day

One of the better performances was by Green Day and the Cast of a new Broadway musical of their album American Idiot. Check it out. This punk band trio from California has matured and evolved into a versatile singer/songwriter group.



Susan Boyle missing in action

Snubbed by the Grammys but loved by the world is Susan Boyle of Scotland. Her debut album, I Dreamed A Dream, was beat out by Taylor Swift by 100,000 sales for best seller of 2009 but wait a minute, all is not as it seems. Taylor Swift released Fearless in November, 2008. Boyle released Dream on November 23, 2009. Swift's was on the market over a year and one month while Boyle's just five weeks and still they almost tied.

Does that seem fair? By the end of January Boyle had caught up to Swift and worldwide has sold an amazing 8 million copies, in just 9 weeks. Still she was snubbed with no Grammy nomination. What is it about this strange 48 year old from Scotland? I say Boyle is the Sarah Palin of the music industry, a fan favorite while being snubbed by the critics.



Ironically Boyle has no regrets about the Grammy snub and as a lifelong Catholic her goal this year is to appear before the Pope when he comes to Scotland this fall. Of course she will also be taking America by storm with her first world tour.

This is what Laura Ferrerro had to say about Boyle on the PopEater blog.

Scottish songstress Susan Boyle seems poised to conquer the world. The unassuming 'Britain's Got Talent' star has already sold more than 1.8 million copies of her debut album 'I Dreamed a Dream' in its first three weeks of release in the U.S. (not to mention the millions she's sold worldwide). She also set an impressive record for the best first-week sales of any woman since SoundScan started tracking in 1991. If Boyle continues to sell albums at this pace, she'll likely steal Taylor Swift's crown as top selling artist of 2009.

So what is it about this homespun 47-year-old charity worker who lives alone with her cat that has us running to our nearest record store to pick up her debut album? We at PopEater checked in with some renowned pop music critics to see what all the fuss is about.

It's Boyle's "every woman" quality that's so appealing believes Aidin Vaziri, San Francisco Chronicle's Pop Music Critic. "She's ordinary. She's like us. People can relate to her," he says. "When she got onstage to face Simon Cowell she brought a million office workers' daydreams to life. I think everyone who saw the ('Britain's Got Talent') video felt moved by it wanted to be part of the story and make sure it had a happy ending."



It's Boyle's "underdog" status combined with our obsession with reality show sagas that has us rooting for her says Gaylord Fields, Senior Editor of AOL Music. "Susan Boyle's story is a classic underdog tale -- yet one that played out in front of the entire world," said Fields. "It embodies a couple of popular reality-show trends in one: it's a music competition coupled with a makeover story, with a hint of medical program savant syndrome thrown in."



"Shows such as 'American Idol' and 'Britain's Got Talent' are as interested in a potential star's looks as much as their talent," said pop music critic Stephen Humphries. "Boyle managed to up-end all that. Dowdy and close to age 50, she seemed to have no right to be trying out for a market most interested in youth and sex appeal. But her voice trumped all that. I think the fact that Boyle isn't a particularly self-confident or precocious person only added to her underdog appeal."

Fields concurs that it is these personal attributes that make Boyle so relatable. "The juxtaposition of Boyle's one-in-a-million voice with her modest looks and her seeming simplicity and innocence add up to something unique -- and ultimately relatable," he says.

Taylor Swift carries Country Music industry but may soon be lost to Pop

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Carrie Underwood - Yet Another Country Act Like Taylor Swift Lost to Pop?



Country music continued a decline in sales dropping 9% in 2009 although it was not because of Taylor Swift whose Fearless album was the top seller of the year in all categories of music and her millions of sales and sold out tours kept the country music industry from falling flat on it's face.



Like it or not Taylor Swift is a genuine pop star and her sweep of all kinds of awards this year have established that beyond a doubt. But she belongs in the pop world. Her lyrics, music, videos and appearances long ago left country music behind. More important, she made it with the sacrifice and help of her mother, not the production company from American Idol like Carrie Underwood, and all the while Taylor has carefully maintained creative control of her life while Carrie never had creative control.

In fact I was surprised Taylor Swift bought a condo in Nashville and not Los Angeles but with her wealth a second mansion in LA should be just around the corner. She should enjoy and take advantage of her position as the top selling female artist of all genres of music this year. To young Taylor Swift country was a stepping stone, not the end game.



Like a young Olivia Newton John, Taylor's transition from new country artist of the year to pop was lightning quick. As she solidifies her position in the pop world through her media savvy and television show appearances she will take along with her the millions of adoring fans who were new to country music this past year because they were not country fans in the first place but young teens who related to Swift and her saga of a teen's life.



She has a lot in common with her friend Miley Cyrus who is a wannabe fellow Disney protégé like Britney Spears, at least a Britney without all the hang ups, and also a young teen sensation. Country music is not their natural home, lifestyle or future.

Forget their roots, Hollywood has first claim on these rising stars with the combination of a far greater pop fan base, motion picture and television contracts, TV appearances and more money than Midas. It is a pretty irresistible lure for a teen queen and perhaps more so for someone later in their career. In truth they should capture the moment for such a moment may never come again in a lifetime. Celebrity worship in America is a very fickle and overwhelming occupational hazard.



Carrie Underwood is not Swift however. Urban backgrounds and leather outfits do not make one a pop star. Hers will be a more difficult path than that of her younger peers like Taylor and Miley. Underwood could have been a country queen but in the end I fear her country music career will suffer as she continues to push her way into the pop field. None of the ladies mentioned are pure country or even country pop and their fan base has not helped other artists sell records unless they happen to be touring with Taylor Swift.

Yet the country record labels will be betting their futures on finding the next Taylor Swift and more traditional country music will be pushed farther into the background with less opportunities for record deals and less opportunities for older, established artists. We will watch the next five years as country labels chase the dream of the next Taylor Swift and lightning doesn't strike that often. While pop songs and teen stars are pushed on the public the real country writers and artists will once again be shoved into the background with the door slammed shut rather than opened.

The handful of kings and queens of country will still rein supreme but the aspiring country songwriters and artists will have to adopt the pop genre to get a deal and make it on the concert tour. Once again country music seems to be self-destructing in the interest of maintaining formula songs and copycat acts.

Once upon a time country music encompassed a great range of styles and looks. Once upon a time country was the innovative genre in music and country fans embraced a wide diversity of styles and looks but once upon a time seems to be a thing of the past. In the world of today many great older acts will be pushed into early retirement by an industry whose obsession with the dollar will always trump their interest in preserving all that is good about country music.

As for Carrie Underwood, who could be a country artist, her handlers have demonstrated over and over again that the American Idol approach is the only one. How much do they understand the record buying public? Well they have captured some impressive pop sales from Idol but look at the enormous exposure it took to pull it off. Any aspiring artist given a television audience of 20-30 million week after week could sell records.



But do they always know what works? Simon Cowell is the genius behind American Idol and locks up the singers participating with his music company. He then works out deals with record labels to sell the records. Carrie Underwood and Kelly Clarkson are country singers who won American Idol and both are being pushed into the pop fields. Surprised? Don't be. Look at the demographic profile of American Idol, which the New York Times’s Bill Carter described as “a phenomenon built on new artists singing mainly middle-of-the-road pop songs of the ’60s and ’70s.”



Susan Boyle, the frumpy Scottish loser of the British version of American Idol, also controlled by Cowell, came within an eyelash of beating Taylor Swift out for the most album sales of 2009 with her new and first CD, I Dreamed a Dream, shooting past 3 million in sales the first month. Music companies thought it would not succeed because she mixed a variety of pop styles on it and it was primarily marketed as a real CD, the kind you had to buy in stores.

The same American Idol team produced Carrie Underwood's televised holiday special that I watched just before Christmas and it confirmed my belief that yet another young country music artist has been lost to the lurid lure of the pop world joining fellow rising star Taylor Swift.



The special was billed as a holiday feature but there was very little country or holiday in it as far as I could see. The producers chose to have Ms. Underwood start the show by forsaking all that is good about country and appearing in a skin tight leather outfit far more suited to a Las Vegas lounge than a family audience. Even her song, Casanova Cowboy, was far from a holiday offering.

It was the same when Underwood and two friends, all white, pimped the Black groups of the 1960's and sang songs like Leader of The Pack, Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow, and Be My Baby with Kristen Chenoweth and Christina Applegate.



Her pop arrangements along with several others was most certainly intended for the American Idol audience, not CMT, and though she did have Brad Paisley and Dolly Pardon appear, they were almost after thoughts to the pop feel and urban bawdiness projected throughout. They almost seemed uncomfortable being part of the show.

The sexy costumes, staging and songs were far from the country music I grew up listening to and watching, and were augmented by rather stupid skits about Jesus and gays which contributed nothing to the holiday season or Underwood reputation. If it were billed as anything but a family, holiday, country music special it would not matter.

Other skits made Carrie out to be an egotist which hardly seemed to be the Underwood I remembered. Clearly the American Idol crowd who controlled the special and control Underwood have no clue about the value of traditional American music during the holiday season. More clearly, they are trapped in their own egos and developed a script for Underwood that made her seem like a juvenile jerk.

Anyway, it was symptomatic of the perilous future for the country music industry. It was almost as if she was reaching far beyond her comfort zone to try and establish her standing in the Taylor Swift world of pop music, as if saying I belong there and I was first. It hardly seems like the Underwood of the past but it is consistent with the American Idol money machine.

Taylor Swift found her own way to the world of pop with her independence, charisma and hard work. No multi-million audiences every week on American Idol. Carrie Underwood had the audiences and sold out to the show producers and now is being pushed out of country into the more profitable pop world. Time will tell if it is a smart move.

Country music in general, and aspiring country writers and artists in particular will be the ones to really suffer. They have no where else to go until the Internet takes over the future direction of the country music industry from the ditto record labels.