Jim Heath and Brian Setzer - amazing rockabilly. Rockabilly is Rockabilly, and it's about being outrageous on its face. Country music is three chords and the truth. Two totally different things.
John 5 (Marilyn Manson, Rob Zombie, The Creatures) also happens to love country, and it loves him back.
Willie just kicked out a really neat new album. At over 80, he still sounds really good (studio work??). He kind of addresses getting old, and talks about friends dropping off, having bad breath all the time, counting blessings.... but it’s funny, and poignant at the same time. If this is his swan’s song, he did it right, OMG. It is classic Willie, and I have been listening to it like crazy the last couple of weeks, since I found it. I can’t recommend it highly enough if you like Willie.
I think what happened is Rock disappeared and merged with Country. Proof: Bon Jovi, Hootie & the Blowfish, Kid Rock, and John Mellencamp now are performing in the country genre. As a Rock fan in the 70's and 80's I like a lot of it - Chris Stapleton in particular is a great example to me of modern country. Having said that, I gotta agree when they start rapping or singing lyrics like "girl, you make my speakers go boom boom" they should be shot (or at least roughed up a bit).
My personal test. There's a spectrum and degrees here, and always there are exceptions, but the baseline: Q. Is it of the same general era of Porter Wagoner, Red Sovine, Webb Pierce, Marty Robbins, Jim Reeves and Ray Price? YES: It's probably country. NO: It's likely a clever simulation of ersatz pseudo-country-ish pop, cynically designed to appeal to the broadest possible audience outside the bounds of traditional country while claiming to be pure country. 1990s and since. Much of it is what classical style muzak is to Mozart or what RINOs are to the conservative base ... you know what it's pretending to be but it ain't that. Pretty sure it knows too. Local oldies (80s and back) country station's tag line refers to those singers who say they're country "but ain't." So they go way way back.