I don't know whether there is "UK country music", as differentiated from US country. I specified "suitable for an English audience" in case there might be a difference in taste between UK and US audiences.

I went to a pub that plays country music the other night and from talking to a few people there tend to agree with what GUEST,C & W Singer said, that a number of songs mentioned on this thread are unknown here in Ireland, while some people seem to know practically every song written by Garth Brooks and Nancy Griffith (and a few other singers whose names I wrote down but don't have here).

There used to be a Country'n'Irish (aka Irish Country and Western) scene here from the sixties to the eighties, part of the showband scene. There were hundreds of showbands, and singers like Larry Cunningham, Philomena Begley, Big Tom, etc., sang American country songs as well as self-written songs in the same style and were immensely popular. You can read about them on the Irish Showbands C&W page. Country music is still hugely popular in Ireland, especially outside the cities, but having spent most of my life abroad, I never got involved.

Again, thanks for the suggestions, Don