We’re back with another one.
It’s hard to believe that 2024 is almost over, but we’re only two weeks away from the new year so that means everybody is releasing their wrap-ups of the best country music from the past year.
But that’s not what we’re here for today.
Every year, we like to have some fun and talk about the WORST country songs released in 2024.
Obviously country music has gotten a lot better since we first started this list in 2017, so the truly bad songs stick out even more these days. And that new song “Georgia Ways” by Quavo, Teddy Swims and Luke Bryan would have probably taken the top 3 spots if it were billed as a “country” song, but I don’t think we’re going to be seeing that one on the country charts anyway.
When it comes to “country” songs, or songs that call themselves country, there were still plenty to choose from. We asked for your suggestions, and there was a clear “winner.” So before we get into our choices, let’s take a look at the fan-voted worst country song of 2024:
“A Bar Song (Tipsy)” – Shaboozey
It’s no surprise that a lot of people named this one their worst country song of 2024. It was one of the biggest songs of any genre, and it seems like Shaboozey was absolutely everywhere performing his interpolation of rapper J-Kwon’s 2004 hit “Tipsy.”
It’s a stretch to call this one country, but let’s be honest: It’s at least catchy, even if it’s pretty overplayed by this point.
Now let’s get into our choices.
It was hard to narrow it down to just three, but here they are.
(And before we get into it, Beyoncé said her album isn’t country, so we didn’t even consider it – but there were plenty of people who mentioned “Texas Hold ‘Em” in the comments).
3. “New To Country” – Bailey Zimmerman
I had never heard this song until Bailey performed it at the CMA Awards a couple weeks ago, and I wish I could go back to the person I was before I heard it. The song sounds like something that was passed over by Brantley Gilbert in 2014 and was discovered sitting on the back of a bro-country shelf where it should have stayed.
“New To Country” is Bailey’s attempt at proving his “country” cred by addressing criticism that he’s not country enough:
“Same liquor in my Dixie, same rowdy bunch with me
I’ll be laid up in the dirt before you еver take it from me
So takе the boy out the truck, take the boy out the mud
Put him up in a PJ, he’ll still try to get them 40s stuck
So line ’em up, turn it up and keep it runnin’
Say whatever you want, but I’m anything but new to country”
Ironically, there’s nothing particularly country about the song, and it’s full of the same cliches from a decade ago about how “you can take the boy out of the country but you can’t take the country out of the boy.” It’s been done a million times, and in much better songs, which is why this song is more than deserving of the honor of one of the worst country songs of 2024.
2. “Austin (Boots Stop Workin’)” – Dasha
Now, this song was actually released in late 2023, but it didn’t blow up until 2024 and first charted in March of this year after going viral on TikTok. And it’s no doubt that it’s a hit, peaking at #18 on the all-genre Billboard Hot 100 chart and #3 on the Hot Country Songs chart.
Like Shaboozey, Dasha was pretty much everywhere performing “Austin” this year. And sure, it’s catchy, but there’s nothing really “country” about the song. It’s your typical TikTok song, one that gets stuck in your head easily, but that doesn’t mean it’s good. I
t’s nothing particularly groundbreaking as far as the lyrics:
“Did your boots stop workin’?
Did your truck break down?
Did you burn through money?
Did your ex find out?
Where there’s a will, then there’s a way
And I’m damn sure you lost it
Didn’t even say goodbye
Just wish I knew what caused it”
And somehow it took SIX different songwriters to come up with that one.
Songwriting has gotten a hell of a lot better in country music over the past couple of years. Even some of the more “pop-sounding” songs have better lyrics that are masked by pop production. But Dasha seemed to go the other way, with superficial lyrics and a pop sound that made it easy for the song to become a hit.
But as we know, just because a song is a hit doesn’t mean it’s good…
1. “Park” – Tyler Hubbard
I think we can confidently put to bed any hope that Tyler Hubbard’s music would improve now that Florida Georgia Line has split up. In fact, it sounds like he’s just releasing FGL music under his own name.
While artists like Chase Rice have moved past bro-country, Tyler Hubbard is clinging to its cold, dead corpse with everything in him, hoping that the same formula for success that made FGL one of the biggest bands in country music will somehow work for him as a solo artist.
Hubbard makes perfectly clear that he has no intention of adapting to the changing times with his latest single, “Park.” The song is straight out of 2013, and would have been right at home on an FGL album. It’s full of cliches like driving down a dirt road with your girl, laying the seat back and watching the stars…I mean, how many times have we heard this exact same song?
“We can burn this old dirt road like a racetrack
Or we can turn the key and let the seats lay way back
Count the midnight windshiеld stars
Watch the sunrise in my arms
If we don’t go nowhеre, girl, I wouldn’t hate that”
What year is it again? Country music has come a long way in its lyricism over the past few years. We’re back to songs with meaning, songs with some depth and that tell a story. Meanwhile, Tyler Hubbard is giving us the 1000th version of a song about driving down a back road? What are we even doing here?
Cheers to 2024. Hopefully there are fewer songs to choose from for this list in 2025.
