[tsearcher]

OP, I suggest you open your mind a little. Of course listening to the same thing over and over will make you tired of any genre. Especially, if you're listening to pop radio. Even the good songs are played so often that you'll get tired of them to the point of hating them. As was already suggested, you have plenty of options available to you. There's satellite, MP3, internet, college radio and NPR.

Now, back to hating country music. You can learn to love at least some of it. Try a gradual approach. Download some Southern Rock. Bands like Lynyrd Skynyrd, Allman Brothers, Georgia Sattellites, Drivin and Crying. They rock but they also have a very heavy country influence. You could try some of the so called alt country. Steve Earle, Niko Case come to mind. There are plenty of others. Violent Femmes did some good country stuff. As already mentioned the Stones have done country also.

To further your progression, you can start listening to the work Johnny Cash did with Rick Rubin. It's pure country with a heavy metal sensibility. A lot of people hate them, but Hayseed Dixie do bluegrass covers of hard rock and heavy metal songs, you might get a kick out of them. Speaking of blue grass Dolly Parton's last 4 of 5 albums have been blue grass and they sound great. She does a real nice cover of Stair Way to Heaven.

Now you'll be ready for some hard core traditional CW music. Start out with Hank Williams III. He made a whole album about drinking and drugging and how much he hates pop country music, the album is great. Then move on to some of the artists he mentions in the album. Besides Johnny Cash, there is Merle Haggard, David Allan Coe, George Jones and his grandfather Hank Williams.

Give it a shot, I think you'll be surprised. I'm from a small midwestern town also. I think growing up, we have acquired a prejudice against country music. We don't want to be hillbillies. Except for Johnny Cash, I hated CW also. I didn't learn to love CW until I moved to Chicago.

BTW, I hope you got payed a lot of money to leave the boundary waters for Colorado.