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To the shock of many, country is the most popular music genre in America right now. Songs from Morgan Wallen, Luke Combs, and others regularly top the Billboard charts. Popular artists from other genres—including Beyonce, Post Malone, and even Ringo Starr—now record country albums to increase sales and expand their audience. The genre has transcended its regional roots and reputation to become the nation’s soundtrack. Suburban kids in Chicago and midwestern fraternity houses now blast country instead of rock or rap.
Coinciding with country’s popularity is the growth of its capital city. As a native of Nashville, I can say it was not a “hip” city growing up. It didn’t receive that much national attention and it felt distinctly Southern. It attracted decent tourism thanks to the country music business, but nowhere near the likes of other major cities. That has changed dramatically over the last decade. It’s now a high-status city that attracts Americans from all over to live or just visit. It doesn’t feel as Southern anymore, but it’s still the cultural capital of Red America. It votes differently from the rest of Tennessee, but it’s part of the same culture. Nashville votes blue, but it’s not really woke. You’ll see Pride flags and other such emblems around the city alongside Trump flags and bumper stickers on pick-up trucks. It feels distinctly red-state, yet not Old South.
Music City’s popularity illustrates a nation moving beyond the extremism of woke, but not embracing “counter-revolution.” Nashville isn’t reviving some Anglo-Saxon past or building new Confederate monuments. In fact, it’s removing traces of the Old South to be a more attractive place to the American middle-class. Nashville is simply a place where Americans of all stripes can shop, work, and party without left-wing busybodies or controversial traditions getting in the way. Residents don’t dwell on the glories of the past or devote themselves to “social justice” in the Tennessee town. They merely want to pursue commercial opportunities without intrusion. It’s the city too busy to be woke.
Nashville is very much an “it” city. It’s one of the top tourist cities in America, famous (or infamous) for its bachelorette parties and other similar excursions. In 2023, its visitor industry generated nearly $11 billion in revenue. It’s experienced insane levels of growth, with cranes dotting the skyline and new apartment complexes going up all the time. The city added almost 275,000 people to its metro area during the 2010s, a 28 percent increase. It’s expected to grow another 56 percent between now and 2060. The city benefits immensely from Tennessee’s friendly business climate. It has no state income tax and offers numerous benefits and advantages to companies and entrepreneurs that move to the Music City. Major companies rank it as one of the best cities in the world for business. It makes sense that it’s a top destination for recent college grads.
When Nashville first began to get notice as an “it” city in the early 2010s, major media thought it could turn into the next Austin. It would be a town populated by liberal hipsters who would make it “weird” and a Mecca for young urban creatives. That didn’t quite happen. It’s instead the top destination for SEC grads fresh out of Greek Life, older carpetbaggers who appreciate that vibe, and conservative podcasters fleeing California. Unlike Austin, weird is still a pejorative in Nashville. People wear Patagonia instead of letting their freak flag fly high. Nashville feels like a playground for a breed of yuppie. A thriving bar scene, pickleball courts, multiple sports teams, and other attractions cement this reputation.
Nashville is safe for a major city. Its murder rate is under 15 per 100,000. That’s significantly lower than Memphis’s murder rate, which stood at nearly 48 per 100,000 for 2024.
Nashville’s demographics are also very different from the other big city in Tennessee. It’s 53.3 percent white, 24.3 percent black, 14 percent Hispanic, and 4 percent Asian. Memphis, on the other hand, is 61 percent black, 24 percent white, under 10 percent Hispanic, and 1.82 percent Asian. Memphis was once the biggest city in the state. That spot was taken by Nashville. Memphis is a city in decline, while Nashville continues to move up.
As another sign of its popularity, Peter Thiel recently told Joe Rogan that Nashville is one of the top two cities he might move to, praising the city’s weather and taxes. “Nashville’s sort of its own real place,” Thiel said. Rogan agreed, saying he could also see himself living in Music City. A California billionaire and America’s most popular podcaster both agreeing that Nashville suits them says a lot about the city’s new status.
It attracts many conservatives. The Daily Wire moved its headquarters to Nashville in 2020. Clay Travis’s Outkick platform is also based in Nashville, as are many other conservative operations. The conservative media presence illustrates the city’s right-coded reputation, even if the city government doesn’t share the politics of the podcasters migrating there.
The city itself is solidly Democratic, but no one will mistake it for Portland on the Cumberland. Most of its mayors have been moderate Democrats who focus more on cultivating relationships with business than culture war. Its current mayor, Freddie O’Connell, campaigned as a progressive in the 2023 mayoral race. He won, but his term isn’t that different from the blue-dog Democrats of the past. He emphasizes his good relationship with Tennessee’s deep-red legislature, his focus on governance over social issues, and his commitment to keeping Nashville business-friendly. O’Connell is even adamant that Nashville cooperate with ICE, unlike other major cities.
Nashville is a blue dot in a sea of red. Its surrounding counties are very conservative. Williamson County went for Donald Trump by 65 percent in 2024. Seventy percent of Sumner County cast a ballot for Trump. Similar results were made in the counties of Wilson, Robertson, and Cheatham. It was most competitive in Rutherford, where 60 percent of the county voted for Trump. These are the people who work in Nashville, but choose to live outside of it. They still shape its character as much as those who live there.
The Middle Tennessee city embodies the New South. A distinctive characteristic of the New South is burying the Confederate past and elevating a different identity. Growing up in the 2000s, Nashville still honored its Confederate heritage. There was a giant Nathan Bedford Forrest statue along I-65 as you drove into the city. The privately-owned landmark was surrounded by Confederate flags. The state capitol prominently featured a bust of the legendary Confederate general. Locations around town liked to highlight their connections to the Lost Cause. Much of that has disappeared in Nashville’s rush to be an “it” city.
The Forrest bust was removed from the State Capitol in 2021. The Forrest statue along the interstate was taken down the same year as well. The accompanying Confederate flags were removed last year. Forrest Avenue in East Nashville was changed to Forest (just one r) Avenue. Institutions around the city, such as Ryman Auditorium, erased Confederate emblems and tributes starting in the 2010s. Franklin High School, just outside of Nashville, changed its nickname from the Rebels to Admirals in 2020. The city tried to remove a Confederate soldier statue from Centennial Park in 2023, but the move was overruled by a state commission. It’s one of the city’s few remaining public monuments to the Old South.
There wasn’t a complete Year Zero historical purge in Nashville. There’s still a statue of Andrew Jackson by the capitol and a nearby state office building named for the hero of New Orleans. In the heart of downtown, you can find historical markers letting visitors know of history that city leaders would want to ignore. One such marker memorializes William Walker, the famous Tennessee filibuster who tried to conquer Nicaragua on behalf of southern interests in the 1850s. Modern history paints him as an evil white supremacist, but Southerners at the time saw him as a daring hero.
The city would much rather have visitors think of John Lewis than William Walker. One of downtown’s chief avenues became John Lewis Way in 2020. (It replaced “Fifth Street.”) There’s now a giant mural celebrating Lewis in the area, complete with other prominent black Nashvillians. It’s unavoidable when walking around, but it doesn’t elicit much attention or comment. People are too busy going to the shops, restaurants, and bars around there to think much of it. It’s just something in the background. It’s about as important to pedestrians as the nearby Jackson statue.
Conservatives may be disappointed in this. Conservative thought stresses the importance of the past and traditions for cementing thriving communities. It doesn’t idolize “rootless” yuppies playing pickleball before heading to the local craft brewery. Conservative intellectuals such as Edmund Burke and Russell Kirk wanted communities to care deeply about their history and identity to inform who they are. Conservatives love the “permanent things” that animate life. Nashville is much more about the temporary things.
While appearances may indicate Nashville is rooted in the past, that’s not the case. One can learn this from its chief cultural export. Country music is the folk music of Middle America. But unlike the folk music of other peoples, it doesn’t evoke a mythical past, ancestral traditions, or collective memory. Country is very much a genre rooted in the present and centered on the temporary things. The memories regaled are mostly that of teenage nostalgia or the simple times their parents lived in. Like Nashville, it’s shed much of its Old South identity, with many of its popular artists disavowing the Confederate flag. Country doesn’t reminisce over some long-ago battle or event that shaped the folk. Most songs are just about cold beers on a Friday night, heartbreak over a girlfriend, and other everyday occurrences. It doesn’t offer fantasy or mythology–it just recounts ordinary experiences. It’s why it’s so popular in our (relatively) depoliticized moment. Normal Americans just want to focus on the mundane and have a good time. Country serves as the soundtrack and Nashville as the vacation spot.
What might replace woke as the dominant cultural form isn’t some return to tradition. It’s the culture and lifestyle embodied by Nashville. The middle-class can enjoy a nice city with wonderful amenities free of crime, social protests, and Confederate statues. The past doesn’t upset the present; it’s all safely tucked away in a museum. What matters is commerce and a good time. That’s what Nashville offers.
It might not satisfy the hopes of right-wingers, but it’s what the masses want. And it’s surely better than what Portland offers.