258. BIG & RICH, "Save a Horse, Ride a Cowboy"
Produced by Paul Worley; written by Big Kenny & John Rich
WEA 6501 2004 Billboard # 56
259. STREETS, "Fit but You Know It"
Produced and written by Mike Skinner
Locked On 679L071CD1 2004 Did not make pop charts
These two singles mark the moment when I found it finally undeniable, almost thirty years after Sugarhill Gang, that rap had gone mainstream. The only thing whiter than country musicians are pasty-faced Brits, for whom calling a woman out on her spray tan is the ultimate form of drunken irreverence. Both groups, though, are out of their element: Big & Rich in a northern city, possibly New York, and the Streets on holiday somewhere.
And so, like legions of drunk and unsure white men before them, they decide to emulate the black men they've heard and seen in popular culture as a way of acquiring courage. They do it in their own way, though, and the results are hilarious--on purpose, I think. We're laughing with them, not at them, right? You can't exactly say that either of these groups has (ahem) flow, but you have to love the self-consciousness with which they wield their newfound mackdaddy personae.
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