Hip-hop says howdy

Troy COLEMAN has become accustomed to standing out in a crowd.

“There’s been question marks everywhere I’ve ever performed -- not just in the last year, but since I started doing what I do 15 years ago,” says the 35-year-old Texan known as Cowboy Troy.

What is it that he does?

“I’m a hick-hop artist,” he says without hesitation. “What that means is I’m a cowboy rapping over hard rock guitars, funky bass lines and country instruments like banjos, fiddles, mandolins and acoustic guitars.”

His musical partners, the genre-bending duo Big & Rich, call him “the original hick-hopper,” and long before becoming country music’s first major black artist of the 21st century, Cowboy Troy turned heads by breaking stereotypes in Dallas nightclubs.

“When I went into techno clubs or hip-hop clubs, people looked at me like, ‘What’s this cowboy doing in here?’ or ‘Dude, do you know where you are?’ ” he says with a laugh. “Then when I’d get on stage and start rapping over break beats, they’d look at me like, ‘What? A cowboy who raps?’ ”

He received a similar reception when he’d visit clubs that featured live or recorded country music. “I’d have my Stetson and my Wranglers and my cowboy boots, and I’d always get some looks,” he says. “Then when I got up on stage and did my thing, it’d be like, ‘Is he rapping on a country song? What the heck is that?’ ”

He’s now raising the same questions on a much larger scale.

In late March, CMT introduced Coleman’s first single, “I Play Chicken With the Train,” on a Thursday prime-time special -- an unusual move for an artist yet to release a major-label album. The single is getting airplay across the country, including on Los Angeles country station KZLA-FM (93.9).

“We put it right on the air and played the heck out of it,” says R.J. Curtis, KZLA’s operations manager. “With the beginning series of spins, the reaction was real negative. But as the week went on, it was more 50-50 in the comments. Sometimes those kind of polarizing songs are the ones you have to pay attention to, because they’re making people react.”

Lon Helton, country bureau chief for the trade magazine Radio & Records, says “I Play Chicken With the Train” is getting airplay at eight other major country stations, including Detroit, Tampa, Fresno, Riverside and Knoxville, Tenn., and that more than 60 stations have tested the song with a spin or two.

“With something this far out in left field, you just try and put it out there and see what people think,” Helton says. “It’s just so different than anything we’ve ever had on country radio that people aren’t sure what to do with it.”

Coleman’s elevated status comes from his high-profile role with Big & Rich, who had Cowboy Troy rap a full stanza on “Rollin’ (The Ballad of Big & Rich),” the opening song on their debut, “Horse of a Different Color,” which sold 2 million copies.

Coleman went on tour last year with Big & Rich, first when the duo opened for country star Tim McGraw and then when they co-headlined arenas with Gretchen Wilson. He performed on network TV at the Country Music Assn. Awards last fall and on the NBA All-Star Game halftime show in February, and costarred in a recent CMT reality series, “MuzikMafia TV.”

All that activity has built up anticipation -- and a swarm of controversy -- for his debut album, “Loco Motive,” scheduled for a May 17 release.

“I think this dude needs to go back to wherever he came from and get out of our country music world,” read an April 7 post on the CMT website, www.cmt.com, where a flurry of racist remarks and harsh rebuttals have kept the webmaster busy deleting comments from Cowboy Troy’s busy message board.

“I know the comments are out there, but you can’t pay attention to that, and I just let it roll off me,” he says. “I like to go around walls rather than try to fight through them.”

Coleman’s not the only artist to attempt such a crossover. Hip-hop star Nelly’s pop hit “Over and Over” featured a duet with country star Tim McGraw; Toby Keith rapped on his hit “I Wanna Talk About Me.” In the ‘90s, country singer Neal McCoy occasionally performed a comic rap during his concerts. Coming from the other direction, rap acts Nappy Roots, Bubba Sparxxx and David Banner all have used some country instrumentation on their Southern-fried tracks.

“I’ve heard a lot of people try it in different ways,” Coleman says. “But I’ve never heard anybody do it like I do.”

Whether the nascent intersection of country and hip-hop develops into anything more than a fleeting curiousity is unclear.

“A lot of people who listen to country radio are transplants from other formats,” says KZLA’s Curtis. “That’s one of the reasons Troy will be a tough sell for some stations. I think he’s exciting and cool, but there will be a lot of programmers who will think this isn’t right for their audience, and you can’t fault them for that.”

Reciting tradition

On the other hand, Coleman says rap -- or at least spoken-word segments -- isn’t new to country music. His favorite songs growing up in rural Victoria, Texas, included Charlie Daniels’ 1979 hit “The Devil Went Down to Georgia,” Jerry Reed’s “Amos Moses” (1970) and Johnny Cash’s “A Boy Named Sue” (1969).

“There’s always been rapping on country records,” says John Rich, who produced Cowboy Troy’s album with his Big & Rich partner, “Big Kenny” Alphin, and Warner Bros. executive Paul Worley. “Only in the past we called it ‘recitations.’ ”

Hank Williams, usually as his alter ego Luke the Drifter, recited sentimental or sorrowful stories over country arrangements. Johnny Horton had several hits in the early ‘60s with rhythmic recitations such as “The Battle of New Orleans.” Jimmy Dean, Bill Anderson, Sheb Wooley and others also were known for recitations.

Moreover, music from Southern black communities often has exerted a strong influence on country music -- and vice-versa.

Jimmie Rodgers, known as the father of country music, recorded with Louis Armstrong in the early ‘30s. Hank Williams, one of country’s legendary figures, cited a black blues street guitarist named Tee Tot as one of his primary influences; Bill Monroe, the founder of bluegrass music, also credited the blues as a primary component of his sound. Western swing pioneer Bob Wills recorded songs he learned from Bessie Smith and other blues and jazz artists.

Meanwhile, blues and R&B; artists cited country music as a major influence. B.B. King and Howlin’ Wolf both said they were fans of the Grand Ole Opry. James Brown once appeared at the Opry too. Ray Charles, most famously, recorded entire albums of country songs. Solomon Burke, Al Green, Etta James, Joe Simon and other soul singers recorded Nashville songs first cut by country artists.

And in the 1950s, one singer helped change the direction of pop music by fusing the sound of R&B; with country: Elvis Presley.

“There’s so much similarity in the lyrics and topics of country, blues and R&B; songs that it’s obvious they were listening to each other,” says Michael Gray, associate editor of the Country Music Foundation and co-producer of last year’s Grammy-winning “Night Train to Nashville” box set, which compiled postwar R&B; songs recorded in Nashville.

“In the beginning,” Gray says, “record companies divided the music along racial lines by creating ‘race records’ and ‘hillbilly records,’ and that tradition has continued all through the years. But the artists always have borrowed and shared influences.”

Indeed, one of the first stars of the Grand Ole Opry was DeFord Bailey, a harmonica-playing African American. But it wasn’t until the emergence of Charley Pride in the late 1960s that country music had a black recording star; indeed, Pride’s first singles were sent out without photos or any mention of his race, so that country DJs would judge the music on its merits.

Other black singers emerged in Pride’s wake, including Big Al Downing, Stoney Edwards and O.B. McClinton. But in the video age, the only black artist to score even minor radio hits has been Cleve Francis, a physician from Washington, D.C. As most of the rest of the U.S. became progressively more integrated, the community of country music performers remained predominantly white.

Cowboy Troy looks as if he may be the first to seriously challenge that barrier since Pride, whom Coleman recently met backstage in Nashville.

Cory Gierman, general manager of Coleman’s label, Raybaw Records, says the momentum Coleman created with Big & Rich in 2004 made him a natural choice to be the first artist for the new Warner-affiliated company. “Troy had such a buzz going already,” says Gierman, who manages the label with John Rich and Big Kenny. “Everywhere Big & Rich played, people would ask about getting a Cowboy Troy album. So we thought we’d give them one.”

As Coleman sees it, he’s just following through on the vision he had when he started performing in Texas clubs.

“I’ve heard all my life that I should change my style, that the cowboy look was holding me back, or that record companies would never be interested in a black man rapping to country music,” he says. “But I knew once people saw me they never forgot me. And I always thought it could work, given the right opportunity. So here I am, getting that opportunity, and I guarantee you, whether you like me or hate me, you’re going to remember me.”

Michael McCall covers country music for The Times periodically from Nashville.