Third Stream Country, or Pop Country For Those Who Don't Listen to the Radio

A woman alone, leaning against the wall of a club, clutching a copy of the Twisters soundtrack on vinyl that she was hoping to get signed. A gaggle of SMU bros, sporting suspiciously fresh cowboy couture as they sing along to every word. Middle-aged mom types (hey that's me) drinking White Claws; girls in "Beer Garden Baby" hats fighting for a spot in the front row...those were just a few of the many varieties of fan at the Tyler Halverson concert in Dallas last week, where a modest but enthusiastic crowd gathered to hear an artist who's operating in the middle of a lot of country polarities.

There's no sign yet that he'll make it on commercial country radio, but his songs have a mid-aughts acoustic pop lilt (think Jason Mraz or John Mayer) that make them a little crowd-pleasing for a somber Americana audience. The South Dakota native has found a bit of a niche in Texas country circles — mostly by doggedly performing at small venue after small venue for a few years now (I haven't forgotten your Sundown at the Granada residency!) — but no one would call his upbeat, R&B inflected country-pop red dirt. 

So what is it, exactly? With the disclaimer that, of course, no artist can/should be pinned down strictly in genre terms (although many country stars embrace "country" in a way artists in other genres reject their assigned labels), the growth of country/Americana/roots/folk in recent years has created more room for artists operating in the in-between. Halverson refers to his music as "Western Amerijuana" which, sure. There were plenty of tittering references to taking a toke during his set, even if the music itself only rarely has a ~stoner vibe~. The "Western" component is something a number of artists are currently embracing — a way to both separate themselves from Nashville a bit and to orient themselves in a post-Yellowstone world (Lainey Wilson's gateway to the mainstream, among many others). Taylor Sheridan helped bring cowboys back in a big way, and no real cowboy would be caught dead on Music Row, etc. 

This "third stream" (forgive the jazz term, it really has no relation besides in-between-ness) has existed as long as country music has had more commercially minded and ostensibly less commercially minded artists; it swells and shrinks as country's vogue does. Right now, there's a boomlet for artists who may or may not sound anything like Tyler Halverson but who occupy a similar place between the Billboard country charts and the kind of Americana with an outside chance at actually getting reviewed by Pitchfork. His fans may have found him through the Twisters soundtrack, some TikTok world that I'm not versed in or a Yellowstone-themed playlist; they might see him at Honky Tonkin' In Queens, or Billy Bob's in Fort Worth. It's two-steppable but not neotrad cosplay, upbeat and not relentlessly corny, country without obsessive reverence. 

The closest artists to him soundwise, I think, are Kaitlin Butts and Maggie Antone — but I'd argue that Tyler Childers and Charley Crockett and Billy Strings and Sierra Ferrell belong in this sphere as well, having reached far beyond the typical "Americana" audience, riding (I'm guessing, at least) social media and big syncs to success that is not really lacking anything from not being on country radio. 

Obviously the closest analogue, and one many of these artists claim, is the outlaw movement of the '70s; in that moment, radio and Music Row eventually embraced the so-called "outsiders" and capitalized on their wide appeal. I don't see a similar sea change happening at country radio today, not when iHeart is cashing Morgan Wallen and Jelly Roll-sized checks. But as music's industry consolidates more and more, any space for artists who aren't able to be neatly categorized (yes, even if the categories they resist are poppier ones) to find an audience is worth celebrating. At least, that seemed to be the attitude of everyone bopping around to "Mac Miller" on Friday night.