Is Dierks Bentley Throwing Shade at Country Music? Or…

Dierks Bentley Appears to Take Shots at Country Music in New Song, But…

Is Dierks Bentley taking a swipe at country music?

There’s a song on Bentley’s new ‘Gravel & Gold’ album which — on the surface — appears to do so.

“Something Real,” is the mandolin-fed fourth track, from his just-released album.   Dierks describes it this way:  “I guess that song does talk about some songs that name drop, or the cliche stuff about dirt roads and girls in bars and neon signs.”

He adds, “I’m as guilty of doing that as much as anybody else.  This song kind of checks me on that.”

Dierks has never won Entertainer of the Year or even Best Male Vocalist at the CMA or ACM Awards.  And he says he thinks getting banned from the Grand Ole Opry was a blessing in the end, because it pushed him in a different direction.  He had been a researcher for a TV station (The Nashville Network), when he was younger; and he’d been caught sneaking back stage, pretty often.  But Bentley was eventually invited to join the GOO in 2005.

Bentley’s ability to serve traditional country music up on a contemporary platter has been on point… Or, no?