When it comes to musical genres, country music is king — even in Seattle. Part of its appeal these days is that it's not the same old music it used to be.

During the next few weeks, country's biggest stars will move in and out of Seattle like airplanes on a runway. Blake Shelton, Alan Jackson, Toby Keith, Taylor Swift, Miranda Lambert, Trace Adkins and Keith Urban all will play big venues this fall, along with a host of older or up-and-coming acts on the fair-stage circuit.

But is their music really country? Or is country really the pop music of our time?

Although it's been one of America's most popular musical genres for decades, today's country stars are shooting for a more contemporary feel, mixing a down-home message with a rocking image.

That may help explain country's continuing popularity in Seattle, a city where plaid flannel isn't linked to John Deere. "It certainly is more pop-oriented than it has been in quite some time, and I think that means it plays to a broader audience," said Mike Preston, program director at Seattle country station 100.7 The Wolf. "My theory on it is that country has crossed over many times. The difference is that the artists look like the artists of today in the pop world."

Arbitron radio ratings from June (the latest available) show that the Wolf, KKWF-FM, is in seventh place in Seattle, fifth out of the music stations. KMPS-FM is not far behind, at 10th. Country stations come in second and third in the Tri-Cities area, and Yakima's top country station is third. Arbitron's numbers show that nationwide, more people listen to country than any other type of music.

Preston notes that Seattle's top three country stations combined make it the most popular format overall for the coveted young male demographic. "When I tell people that, they're always pretty surprised," Preston said. "Country is huge in Seattle. It's huge in Minneapolis. It's huge in Denver. These are also places that are very metropolitan. Country is very popular all along the West Coast."

Genre-sampling

A number of country artists earn crossover credibility by flirting openly with other genres. Rising star Jason Aldean features hip-hop artist Ludacris in one of his songs; Toby Keith also brings rap into his. The band Sugarland sometimes breaks into reggae. While this might make purists run for the country hills, it helps country music evolve in a world where all kinds of genre lines are blurred.

Crossover stars like Eric Church, who is managed by the same group that manages Metallica and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, prefer baseball caps to cowboy hats and tight T-shirts instead of checkered button-downs. "It's up to us to move the needle," Church says on his website. "People like Waylon and Cash or Garth and Strait — they all took the format and said, 'We're going over here,' and they all changed the direction of the music a little bit."

The JaneDear Girls, performing at Snoqualmie Casino on Saturday, also mix retro and modern. The duo, Susie Brown and Danelle Leverett, did a tongue-in-cheek sendup of the T-Pain rap song "I'm on a Boat" as part of a vote-getting effort before the Academy of Country Music Awards, but they usually play multiple stringed instruments and blend their voices into a quintessentially Nashville sound. "We like to say that we love rockin' music that people can clap to and dance to," Leverett said in a phone interview.

Local country band Aces Up, which plays at the Kitsap County Fair on Aug. 25, laces down-home lyrics with youthful rock-style guitar licks its members absorbed during Seattle-area childhoods. "We've had a lot of people come up to us [at shows] and say, 'I was never really a fan of country music.' That's the biggest compliment we could get," said Tyler Adams, lead vocalist.

Influences and interaction

Country fans tend to follow a pattern: They grow up listening to it with their parents, ditch it during high school and college, but feel drawn to it again in adulthood.

That's the case for many country musicians themselves. Almost all of them list rock musicians among their musical influences. Tyler Adams and his brother and bandmate Jason "couldn't stand" their parents' country music while they were in high school. But at some point, "We were trying too hard to not like it," Jason Adams said.

They brought their high-energy rock sensibility to Aces Up, which tours around the West and recorded its first album in Nashville earlier this year. "A lot of our lyrics can be compared to an older style, like Waylon Jennings, but our shows are more like rock music," Jason Adams said.

There's another factor at work in country's popularity. Country-music stars such as Taylor Swift, Carrie Underwood (an "American Idol" winner) and Lady Antebellum have jumped on the multimedia bandwagon in a big way. They boost their popularity with robust websites, YouTube videos and social- and mainstream media campaigns. "The current crop of stars is especially media-savvy and media-friendly," Preston, the WOLF program director, said.

Blake Shelton, who will be playing at Snoqualmie Casino on Thursday, has made music for more than a decade, but his cachet spiked this year when he took a gig as a judge on the music-competition show "The Voice."

That spot has made him an ambassador of country to the mainstream, the way "American Idol" has for its successful country singers. The reigning "American Idol" winner, Scotty McCreery, is a soulful 17-year-old singer who likes to quote Bible verses and is inspired by old-school country stars like George Strait.

Shelton's latest album, "Red River Blue," debuted last month atop the charts — all the music charts, not just country — and he's been featured recently in Parade magazine and The New York Times. Even before he was on television, he poured information out to his fans via his website, Twitter and the "BS'ers" fan club.

Familiar themes

Underneath country's slick new look, though, are the same kinds of sentiments that have made country a staple for generations. Whether the artists are in leather vests or leather pants, they still sing about God, patriotism, family, personal and financial troubles and old-fashioned romance.

They're the kind of topics anyone can relate to, described in family-friendly lyrics that cross generations. "I think it helps people remember those good things that really make them happy," said Tyler Adams, adding that his grandparents never heard him play guitar when he played rock music.

Country "takes pride in telling real stories that people live," said the JaneDear Girls' Brown. "People say, 'Oh, that's me.' It's true and it connects."

Leverett adds that country music lets her be a professional musician without the Lady Gaga-style stunts expected of female pop artists. "We prefer to keep our clothes on," she said.

Christy Karras: christykarras@gmail.com

Information in this article, originally published August 11, 2011, was corrected August 17, 2011. A previous version of this story stated that Carrie Underwood was an American Idol runner-up. Underwood was the American Idol winner in 2005.