Tyler Childers' new album revives question of what defines Americana music

Why it matters: "Snipe Hunter" creates a golden opportunity for a refresher on what defines Americana music, the umbrella genre that has its roots in the Nashville music industry.

Driving the news: Steven Hyden, one of the preeminent rock music critics, propelled the discussion forward with his column in which he lauded "Snipe Hunter," while also expressing disdain for the use of the term "Americana" to categorize it.

• Hyden says Childers' latest release is good old-fashioned heartland rock.
• "On my list of pet peeves, it's up there with people who spell 'whoa' like 'whoah' and 'rock star' like 'rockstar,'" Hyden said of the term Americana. "I've conceded [defeat] on those other two fronts, but I continue to fight for heartland rock. It partly stems from my distaste for 'Americana,' which I always type out reluctantly because it's part of the common nomenclature, even though the 'sepia-toned old-timey small-town folk' connotations are corny and kind of gross."

State of play: For a refresher on the term Americana, we went to the expert, Jed Hilly, who's executive director of the Americana Music Association.

• We asked Hilly to read Hyden's column and then called him up for a history lesson.

Flashback: First, the history lesson from Hilly. On the heels of the unprecedented chart-topping domination of country artists like Garth Brooks and Shania Twain, Music Row record labels began to chase their successors, Hilly says. The search for country stars with pop appeal left artists like Emmylou Harris, Rosanne Cash, Steve Earle and Rodney Crowell somewhat on the outside looking in.

• At the same time, those artists felt out of place in country music, Hilly points out bands like Wilco, the Jayhawks and the Old 97s were making alt-country albums that bled into multiple genres.
• A group of music industry stakeholders met at the 1999 SXSW festival to discuss carving out a new trade association to give those artists a home. About 30 people, including Harris and Crowell, convened in Nashville that fall for three days to brainstorm ideas. Out of those meetings, the Americana Music Association was created.

Zoom out: Advancing Americana music is a professional passion of Hilly. Over the last decade, Americana Fest has grown into one of Nashville's preeminent music festivals, and its awards show is consistently one of the best concerts all year in Music City.

• Hilly was instrumental in getting the definition "Americana music" added to Merriam-Webster's dictionary in 2011, and two years before that, the Recording Academy created a best Americana album Grammy Award category.

What he's saying: "The truth is Americana is not a vertical genre, it's a horizontal genre," Hilly tells Axios. "It goes through gospel, rock, folk, blues, bluegrass."

Zoom in: As a demonstration of how wide-reaching the genre is, over the years the Americana Music Awards have honored blues artist Buddy Guy, the Fisk Jubilee Singers and John Mellencamp (Hyden favorably compared Childers to Mellencamp in his column).

• More recently, Americana has expanded to include bands typically described as indie rock like Waxahatchee, Big Thief and Hurray for the Riff Raff.

The bottom line: Over his discography, Childers ventured from squarely a country artist to a rock-leaning singer-songwriter in the mold of Mellencamp. For Hilly, it's all Americana music.

• "Americana is artists who write stories to tell through songs in the best way they can," Hilly says. "They are singers who can sing, players who can play. And writers who can write."

Go deeper: The New York Times Margaret Renkl wrote about the "magic of a weird Tyler Childers pop-up concert."

Listen to "Snipe Hunter" on Spotify or Apple Music.