
There was a time—not long ago—when Nashville was still about the music.
Not the influencer photo-ops. Not the rooftop bars with $18 bourbon spritzers. Not the bachelorette parties running wild down Broadway in coordinated fringe and faked-up Southern twangs. No, this town used to bleed authenticity. It wasn’t a backdrop for content. It was a living, breathing song—gritty, worn, imperfect, and real as rain.
The CMA Fest used to feel like a celebration of the genre. Even that feels different now. A million out-of-towners flood into our streets with the same enthusiasm they bring to Times Square. Cowboy hats from Amazon. Pre-worn boots from Nordstrom. TikToks in front of the same neon sign that’s seen more selfies than guitars. Not bad, just different.
And don’t get me wrong— if you haven’t been. The festival slaps and I sure ain’t mad at the success. I love the money! The city deserves it too. That’s the push and pull. Our stars are the biggest in the world now. Luke, Morgan, Jelly—hell, even Miley came up off our dirt. The whole world wants to sound like us, dress like us, be us.
But that’s the part that cuts.
They want our flavor but not our history. Our style, not our struggle. Our image, not our integrity.
Nashville’s industry used to be music. Now it’s tourism.
And tourism don’t love you back.
Tourism don’t stay up late writing songs that keep you alive. It doesn’t raise kids in double-wides or teach Sunday school or run cables in a honky tonk. Tourism ain’t got calluses or stage fright. Tourism only wants a selfie and a souvenir.
We traded the soul of this city for bottom lines and hotel taxes. And what’s worse? We smile and welcome the change like its progress.

But if you’ve been here a while… you know better.
They even put an Apple Store on Broadway.
Let that sink in.
Where there used to be grease-stained blue jeans and worn-out work boots, there’s now Apple Watches and auto-tuned playlists. The rough edges got sanded down into commercial polish. The roadies and union crews who built this city now work behind the scenes for tourists who don’t know the difference between pedal steel and pop radio.
I don’t play music. But I move with the men and women who make the stage go up.
Stagehands. Freight crews. Real damn labor.
I see the old road dogs—replaced by a new class of failed musicians who found a second life in scene-chasing and brand-building. We used to celebrate the working class. Now we’ve commodified it.
I see it everywhere now—fake Southern drawls from Ohio, fake grit from LA influencers trying to play cowgirl. Folks pretending to be from here just to soak up the shine that comes off our people. They’re cosplaying a culture that we were born into. That we bled for.
Is this how old-school New Yorkers felt watching Times Square turn into Disneyland? Watching the soul of their city get swallowed by spectacle?
Because that’s what this feels like.
I moved here for the music. For the sweat in the writers’ rooms and the heartache in every baritone note. For the early mornings on a dock and the late nights listening to a guitar. I loved the old Nashville—the one with a busted neon sign and a bar tab you could pay in quarters. The one where nobody wore cowboy hats unless they’d earned the right.
That Nashville?
She’s gone. Head on down to Memphis. 🤔🤔🤔

Tags: #Nashville #RunTheDamnDock #OldNashville






















