Artist Guide

Curt The Country Man: Country Styling

November 1, 2024

Country Stylin’

Country in southern soul? You either love it or you don’t. And loving it doesn’t mean you don’t love traditional southern soul. It simply means country has elbowed its way into southern soul and enriched it in the same way hiphop (“Hell Naw To The Naw Naw” by Bishop Bullwinkle, “Take Your Time” by Joe Nice & Sean Dolby), funk (“Mr. Sexy Man” by Nellie “Tiger” Travis, “Roll It” by Mr. Sam) and zydeco (“Don’t Mess With My Tu Tu” by Denise LaSalle, “Zydeco Bounce” by T.K. Soul, “Call The Police” by Stephanie McDee) have at first shocked and ultimately enriched the genre in prior eras.

Stan Butler was one of the first to begin experimenting with country styling a few years ago in songs like “My Deaf Brother” and “Mighty Good Woman,” tunes that appeared to be novelties because of their unusual reliance on spoken narratives and hyperbole. They became the most successful recordings of his career. Then, both before and after R&B superstar Beyoncé recorded her country album early in 2024, a flood of country-inspired music including Ciddy Boi P’s “This Is Texas (Beyoncé Reply),” Cecily Wilborn’s “Southern Man” (2023) and Curt The Country Man’s “Back Roads” (early 2024), inundated southern soul, forcing deejays and programmers into some awkward decisions about what constitutes southern soul in the eyes of its audience. That transformation is still roiling southern soul playlists today. This month Daddy B. Nice features four of the most dominant musicians in this new wave of countrified southern soul.

Country Stylin': Featured Artists:

Stan Butler

“Down In The Kountry” (feat. West Love)
“My Deaf Brother”
“Cowboy Ride”
“Mighty Good Woman”

Ciddy Boi P

“This Is Texas (Beyoncé Reply)”
“One More Day”
“Fishing Hole”
“Can I Get It” (feat. Till 1 & Mississippi Hummin’ Boy)

Curt The Country Man (aka GMB Li Curt)

“Back Roads” (feat. Shawty Mac)
“Back Roads” (feat. Marcellus The Singer)
“2 Beers”
“Country Man”

Cecily Wilborn

“Red Cup Blues,”
“Southern Man”
“Southern Man (The Anthem)” feat. West Love
“Living For The Weekend”

Southern Soul Country Style: The Top Singles

1.
”Southern Man”---Cecily Wilborn

2.
”Back Roads”---Curt The Country Man

3.
”Down In The Kuntry”---Stan Butler

4.
”One More Day”---Ciddy Boi P

5.
”Red Cup Blues”---Cecily Wilborn

6.
”This Is Texas”---Ciddy Boi P

7.
”2 Beers”---Curt The Country Man

8.
”Mighty Good Woman”---Stan Butler

9.
”Living For The Weekend”---Cecily Wilborn

10.
”My Deaf Brother”---Stan Butler


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May 1, 2024:

Originally published in Daddy B. Nice's Top 10 Singles.


Daddy B. Nice's Top 10 "BREAKING" Southern Soul Singles For. . .

-------MAY 2024-------

1. “Back Road”-------Curt The Country Man feat. Mar-
cellus The Singer

Curt The Country Man’s “Back Road” is the glorious apex of the country style sweeping through southern soul with songs like Cecily Wilborn’s “Red Cup Blues,” Country Boy’s “Jeans & Boots” and Ciddy Boi P’s “This Is Texas”. This full-scale country trend began in earnest, fittingly enough, a few months ago with Curt’s rousing music video of ”Back Roads” (plural) under his previous (or alternate) name GMB Li Curt (#2 March Top 10 Singles). This remix replaces guest rapper ShawtyMac from the original with southern soul balladeer Marcellus The Singer, otherwise retaining key elements of the original like the double-tracking of Curt’s vocals, the horses’ neighing, the wild cry. “Back Road” is a personal artistic statement comparable to J-Wonn’s monumental “I Got This Record,” and if it gets distributed to southern soul deejays it’s a shoo-in for southern soul song of the year.

Listen to Curt The Country Man & Marcellus The Singer singing “Back Road” on YouTube.



Originally published in Daddy B. Nice's Top 10 Singles.


Daddy B. Nice's Top 10 "BREAKING" Southern Soul Singles For. . .

-------MARCH 2024-------

......2. "Back Roads"-----GMB Li Curt feat. ShawtyMac

How close are southern soul and country? Deejays can segue seamlessly from gritty, ultra-bluesy "Mark You Off" by Miron Simpson (2023 Best Southern Soul Debut Nominee and Best Male Vocalist) into GMB Li Curt's pure country music anthem, "Back Roads," and vice versa. Like a tree toppling in the forest, "Back Roads" came and went without notice last year, although 58,000 hardy souls viewed it on YouTube with overwhelmingly enthusiastic comments. And as a southern soul fan, if you're feeling a little ambivalent about enjoying a country song as much as I recounted myself doing in "Will Southern Soul Deejays Play Country-Western/Southern Soul?," remember that southern soul made its post-disco revival in the mid-eighties with Z.Z. Hill's "Down Home Blues," considered "country-bluesy" at the time.

Listen to GMB Li Curt & ShawtyMac singing "Back Roads" on YouTube.



Originally published in Daddy B. Nice's Top 10 Singles.

Daddy B. Nice's Top 10 "BREAKING" Southern Soul Singles For. . .

-------NOVEMBER 2024-------


...7. "Whiskey"-----Curt The Country Man feat. Countryboii Tye.

More than anyone else, Curt is the singer who has me listening to "southern soul country" for the first time in my life. No matter how many times I hear it, "Back Roads" never fails to knock me out. And what's fascinating to me is how enthralled The Country Man is with drinking. Mel Waiters sang about whiskey but he was actually not into alcohol. Curt is into alcohol the way a high school kid is, and it's that apparent youth, that apparent rawness, that dreamy infatuation with the drinking lifestyle and ultimately that seeming lack of self-awareness that makes Curt The Countryman even more interesting and ironically authentic.

Listen to Curt The Country Man and Countryboii Tye singing "Whiskey" on YouTube.

--Daddy B. Nice