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Cam Country Music Diane

Maybe you’ve heard a couple of her hit songs like “Burning House” (nominated for a Grammy!) or “Diane“. Perhaps you saw her on “American Idol”. Or maybe you’re a big country fan. Chances are, Cam has probably popped up in your life once or twice — whether you knew it or not. So here are five things you need to know about the country singer who’s taking on the Boys’ Club of Country and is about to hit it bigger than big.

Cam is from California

When we think of country singers we usually think Oklahoma, Texas, or the South. But Cam was born in Huntington Beach, California and raised outside of San Francisco. It doesn’t mean she doesn’t have country roots though, she spent a big part of her childhood on a ranch, listening to Patsy Cline on repeat. “My grandparents have a horse ranch in Oceanside,” she explained in an interview with the San Diego Tribune. “It’s the spot where we would spend holidays, the summertime. It is one of my places of Zen, and it’s a big part of who I am.”

She’s a true songwriter. She even wrote for Miley Cyrus

Cam is a true singer-songwriter, not only writing songs for her own albums but for others as well. Before she hit breakout success in 2015 she was credited with a track on Miley Cyrus’ album Bangerz called “Maybe You’re Right”.  Her writing is so good that while building her career in Nashville she was asked to write songs full time and offered a publishing contract — but turned it down to work on her own music.

“I had an offer for a publishing deal, but if you go in too soon, you don’t have the same value—no one knows what your potential is,” she explained in an interview. “I just felt like I knew what I could do. I had this need to prove myself on my own before we got into the Nashville system of publishing.”

She almost wasn’t a famous singer … 

If Cam wasn’t a famous country artist she may have become a Psychologist. She earned a Bachelor’s Degree from the University of California Davis in Psychology, speaks Italian and even worked in a research lab at Stanford. But music was always her true passion and while working as a researcher she decided to pursue her dreams. As she told Noisey, “When I was 24, I was doing psychology research and was working in a lab, and I asked my professor, ‘Should I go for it?’ And she was like, ‘Picture yourself at 80 years old, which would you regret more? Not doing music or not doing psychology?’ And I was like, definitely music. So I left and started working.”

She is outspoken about supporting other women

Cam has been vocal about her feminism, women supporting women and the need for more women in positions of power in country music.

“People come up to me and they’re like, ‘Oh, aren’t you so happy about the renaissance that’s happening of women? There’s so many women artists. There’s so many female artists'” she explained to ET about the state of country music. “When you have one female artist in the top 50 on a chart, that is not a renaissance. When you have such a small number of program directors working in radio that are women, that tiny number, that’s not a renaissance. When you have the heads of labels not being women, that’s not a renaissance.”

AMEN!

She’s taking on the Boys Club of Country and not backing down

Cam has mentioned that getting played on country radio as a female artist is no walk in the park. And she’s not wrong.

Back in 2015 radio consultant Keith Hill admitted in an interview that country radio purposely doesn’t play as many women as men. “Trust me, I play great female records, and we’ve got some right now; they’re just not the lettuce in our salad. The lettuce is Luke Bryan and Blake Shelton, Keith Urban and artists like that. The tomatoes of our salad are the females.” The incident became known as “tomato-gate” and put into words what a lot of female artists were complaining about.

Cam is having none of it. “There’s a weird myth that’s one of the excuses: ‘Women don’t like listening to other women.'” Which she says is B.S.

“The majority of country listeners are female (actually true) but apparently we prefer listening [to] male singers so we can ‘dream about them being [our] boyfriend’ (actually said to me), she tweeted. “Sure hope #iHeartAwards picks the hottest one, cause that’s all my lady-brain can understand!”

She thinks country music should stop underestimating its female fans.

We couldn’t agree more!

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