Today's country music isn't country.

It's cute. It's catchy. It's pop.

What once were ballads about heartbreak and loneliness and rural lifestyle have been given adrenaline shots of giddy rhythms and hook melodies. Fiddles and steel guitars are background to everything electric.

The lyrics still allude to trucks and bars, sure but with an ironic tone. It's like the investment banker who wears a cowboy hat to the office; he likes the attention and maybe romanticizes country living, but he'd rather die than set foot near a tractor.

It was a different story, in the glory days of Loretta Lynn's country stardom from the '60s to '80s. There was no irony in the lyrics. She sang about backwoods, barefoot living, about her mother's worn fingers from washing the linen, about raising an army of kids while being dirt poor, because that was her legitimate upbringing.

This was back when a female country singer was recognized by the sausage curls of her hair. When country songs were dominated by stripped-down sweetness, a fiddle and steel guitar and keening melody. When country music gently reined society back to a mosey pace, if things got a little stirred up.

Sometimes, I think we miss that.

There was proof enough last Saturday night, when I was amid the throng of the sold-out crowd to see Loretta Lynn perform at the Northern Quest Resort and Casino.

Of course there was trepidation. How would Loretta sound at 80, for God's sake? How long could she last on stage?

But she's an idol of country music, someone who palled around with Patsy Cline. Just seeing her would be enough.

And we got a lot more.

Before Loretta made her grand entrance, her twin daughters Peggy and Patsy took the stage. With the same raw southern twang of their mother, they belted "Living on Tulsa Time" in a gorgeous harmony, their mirror faces checking in with each other for trading off on the chorus.

Then the lights dropped, and out Loretta swept, glittering in all her old-school country resplendence. She was decked out in a poofy, collared white dress, her sausage curls still in tact. The crowd climbed to its feet when she started to sing.

The worries were for nothing. Loretta's vocals were still strong, edged with honky tonk sass, sweet as if she was still a doe-eyed 20-something. She still held the microphone daintily, like it was a glass accessory, and swayed as she crooned.

No more production necessary. She's Loretta Lynn. All you have to do is listen to the heartbreaking stories pouring out of her mouth.

She went through all the hits, "You're Lookin' at Country," "Honky Tonk Girl," with the big favorite, "Coal Miner's Daughter" saved for very last.

Her songs took us through the drudgery of poverty, "Here in Topeka, the flies are a buzzin,' the dog is a barkin,' and the floor needs a scrubbin,'" and liberation from child rearing, "I'm tearin' down your brooder house, 'cause now I've got the pill." They took us through rage, with women in the crowd singing along to "You Ain't Woman Enough to Take My Man," inspired by Loretta's notoriously cheating ex-husband Oliver Lynn.

It was among many songs, her daughter Peggy had said earlier, "That got my daddy in trouble."

I found it hard not to compare to what's popular in country today. When Loretta crooned lyrics like, "I've got the records, she's got you," my heart splintered, an effect Taylor Swift notably doesn't have when she whines about high school crushes. And I found "God Bless America Again," an appealing humble stance on our country's problems, compared to Toby Keith promising to shove boots up our international adversaries' butts.

When the concert was done, it was done, the lights on stage flipped off as Loretta plucked up her skirt and whisked off stage. She was 80, after all, and we got what we came for.

Just a reminder of what country used to be, what it should be.

Even at 80, country looks pretty good.

Alecia Warren is a staff writer for The Press. She can be reached at 664-8176 Ext. 2011.