Bucky Covington & Shooter Jennings: "Drinking Side of Country"

Bucky Covington made his bones on American Idol, and likely as not this will be the first and last WKMR entry anyone from that show will ever get. Two things though: 1) he's got Shooter Jennings along for the ride, and 2) Covington wrote the song with his brother, so he deserves the lion's share of credit for this being a legit beer swiggin' tune (one of these days I fully intend to post a country song that isn't about getting drunk).

"Drinking Side of Country" will feature on Covington's sophomore album Good Guys - out September 11 - but I'm not vouching for the rest of that shit until I hear it.

Zac Brown Band: "The Wind"

99% of country music videos seem to feature either spliced together performance footage or the singer standing next to his weathered pickup out in an open field somewhere. Bo-ring. So how awesome is it that the Zac Brown Band got Mike Judge of Beavis & Butthead / King of the Hill fame to animate their video for new single "The Wind"? Actually it looks like Judge has even stepped up his game on this one, both conceptually as well as stylistically.

Get More: The Wind, Zac Brown Band, Zac Brown Band Videos

Josh Abbott Band: "My Texas" [feat. Pat Green]

Josh Abbott is not the most gifted singer out there, but he's got a flair for writing some decent country tunes. Aside from drinking, the next best thing I want to hear a redneck troubadour sing about is my home state of Texas, and if you didn't get a proper hint from the title "My Texas" is in the vein of Gary P. Nunn's "What I Like About Texas", basically a to do checklist about everything that's great about the Lone Star State.

By the way, according to Wikipedia "My Texas" was released as a single in 2011, but the album containing the song - Small Town Family Dream - just came out two weeks ago on Pretty Damn Tough Records, so I'm shoehorning this in as a new release anyway. Maybe that's cheating, I don't know, but it seems to me that giving a shit just ain't country.

Chase Rice: "I Like Drinking, Cause It's Fun"

Chase Rice is one of those new breed of Nashville country singers who are heavily influenced by the Southern rock inflected, party down Texas Country / Red Dirt tradition, even though they've never lived anywhere near Texas or Oklahoma. That's not a complaint, however; when country music is getting polarized into good time "dude" songs and overly sappy, American Idol-friendly chick tunes I'll take as much Texas influence as we can shoehorn into Nashville.

Chris Young: "Save Water, Drink Beer"

Don't let the fact that Chris Young won the 2006 season of Nashville Star throw you off.  Though Nashville Star was positioned as the country version of American Idol - before AI turned their own focus to country music and made NS irrelevant - the talent on that show was far more authentic and less teeny-bopper than the Simon Cowell juggernaut (first season winner Buddy Jewell has also gone on to legit chart success, but not as much as third place finisher from that same season, Miranda Lambert).

Chris Young is on his third album for RCA Nashville, which has netted him his fourth #1 chart single, "Tomorrow".  Maybe I'll celebrate that song mañana, but for right now it's the weekend which means rationalizations for drinking are still in order:

Toby Keith: "Red Solo Cup"

We all know Toby Keith is an insufferable douche, but occasionally he stops talking politics and turns his attention to getting wasted, and it's on these occasions that he often pulls a gem out of his ass.

1990: "Corner Store", Jonathan Richman

While we're being all retro... "Corner Store" was originally recorded in a more upbeat rendition on Jonathan Richman's 1986 album It's Time For, but I think this more stripped down Americana version from 1990's Jonathan Goes Country serves the humorous yet wistful lyrics better.