Kacey’s vocals needed a boost too, and that’s not her fault either. Meanwhile you have two guys standing behind consoles doing Lord knows what, and one of the best steel guitar players in the world, “‘Smokin’ Brett Resnick, relegated to playing a redundant acoustic guitar line with the guy beside him, and incredibly too loud in the mix. It’s difficult to determine whether the two fiddle players were actually playing live at any point, but at the 2:42 mark of the video (see below), you clearly hear fiddle when the two players are not playing. The song started with a backing track to emulate the song as it is on the record. Meanwhile there were too many people on stage with her, while you heard instruments playing that were not there. She didn’t look comfortable, and this translated to the audience shifting in their seats. Her attempts at dancing and choreography felt forced and scripted. Kacey came across as awkward, seeming to be more concerned with how her hair was resting against her leisure suit as opposed to hitting the high notes of the song with strength. Her “High Horse” rendition began by the camera zeroing in on a bedazzled saddle hanging from the rafters, and that was apt symbolism of how the performance would be much more about presentation and appearance as opposed to substance. Song selection was just the beginning of the disappointment in Kacey’s performance. Instead we received the disco-infused “High Horse,” and the mild, but inoffensive “Slow Burn.” “If she doesn’t I will hunt her down.” Unfortunately though, “Space Cowboy,” nor any of the other more universally-acclaimed songs from Golden Hour made their way onto the Saturday Night Live stage. “Tired as hell but I gotta see my girl Kacey Musgraves sing #spacecowboy on SNL,” said Charles Kelley of Lady Antebellum on Twitter Saturday evening. So even if you didn’t have vested rooting interest in Kacey Musgraves, you were inclined to tune in Saturday night. The album has its critics too, but even many of them will admit to Golden Hour including some stellar songs such as the stirring “Space Cowboy,” the heart-fluttering “Butterflies,” or what may truly be one of the “best” songs in country music in 2018 so far, the album’s closing number, “Rainbow.” Kacey’s also known for turning in performances that if nothing else, are interesting in how they’re presented with her dress and stage getup. According to some, it’s best record that will be released in country music all year, which is a bold claim since we’re not even half way through 2018. The record has been garnering substantial acclaim in media, including and especially outside of established country media. You have to be making a buzz behind your music in the cool, hip crowd, sort of like Kacey Musgraves has been doing with the release of her latest record Golden Hour. You don’t just have to be a big name to play Saturday Night Live. Being asked to play the show itself has become a hallowed gesture, and it has the potential to help create, extend, or in some cases, diffuse the buzz behind an artist or a song. Though the allure and effectiveness of a nationally-broadcast television performance for a music artist has lost a lot of its importance in the modern media makeup, the Saturday Night Live stage still holds both a sway upon popular culture, and an opportunity to reach a dialed-in and diverse audience that is more important than the sheer numbers Nielsen tabulates.
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