Wanted to stop this off by saying that if you have any thoughts about anything I write about, I'd love to hear them. Whether you agree or disagree, I welcome opinions of all kinds. All I ask is that everyone remain respectful. I had a comment come in last night on one of my reviews that I ended up deleting due to the use of profanity. That's something that I'm not going to tolerate. There's no need for it. I don't like deleting comments, but I will remove any that include profanity. Right now I allow anonymous comments and I'd like to keep it that way. Hopefully that comment will prove to be a fluke; it's the first one I've gotten that I felt I had to remove. I really don't think this will be a big problem, but I wanted to get this out there.
So now that that's taken care of, here's the rest of my ACM thoughts, picks and predictions. Kicking it off with...
The nominees: Blown Away - Carrie Underwood
Chief - Eric Church
Red - Taylor Swift
Tailgates & Tanlines - Luke Bryan
Tornado - Little Big Town
My thoughts? Okay, so I have each of the albums nominated and have listened to all of them. Some more than others, but I'm familiar with all of them. Remember my mini rant about politics in the first part? Well, politics is the only thing that explains Taylor being nominated. I know that it went triple platinum here in the United States and sold over 5 million worldwide. It's widely successful, but you know what it isn't? Country. And look, I have a very open mind when it comes to country music. But I've listened to Red multiple times and there's no country there. It's a pop album. As such, it just doesn't belong here. Especially not when there's been so many great country albums released in the past year. I would've loved to see Dierks Bentley's Home or Kellie Pickler's 100 Proof nominated instead.
My pick? Chief - Eric Church. Hands down my favorite of the bunch.
My prediction? There's some really good albums up this year. Seeing as how Taylor's shouldn't even be included, I'd like to rule it out. Tornado has done some great things for Little Big Town, but while it might lead them to a win in Group I don't really see them winning here. Same for Tailgates and Tanlines for Luke - it could help his odds in Male Vocalist, but again, don't see him winning this. I feel like this is really a fight between Blown Away and Chief. I'll go ahead and call it for Chief.
Single of the Year *This award is given to the artist(s), producer(s) and record company.
The nominees: "Even If It Breaks Your Heart" - Eli Young Band
"Over You" - Miranda Lambert
"Pontoon" - Little Big Town
"Springsteen" - Eric Church
"Wanted" - Hunter Hayes
My thoughts? Tough category! All of these songs were pretty big. I'd go as far to say that what we have here is a collection of career songs. You know, songs that really help to define an artist. Songs that represent some sort of turning point or stepping stone in their careers. I really think that in the future, when we think about these artists, these are going to be some of the songs that come to mind. Makes for a very interesting category.
My pick? I'll go with "Springsteen".
My prediction? Oh boy. I feel like we can remove "Even If It Breaks Your Heart" and "Wanted" from the running. Good songs, but it seems like each of the other three were bigger. I'd really love to see the final numbers because I bet it's going to be close. Like insanely close. Unfortunately that's never going to be something we know. I've been thinking about this a lot ever since I first saw the list of nominees, gone back and forth a few times. But I'm going with my gut instinct and calling it for "Pontoon".
Song of the Year *This award is given to the composer(s)/songwriter(s), publisher(s) and artist.
The nominees: "A Woman Like You" - Lee Brice, written by Phil Barton, Johnny Bulford & Jon Stone
"Even If It Breaks Your Heart" - Eli Young Band, written by Will Hoge & Eric Paslay
"Over You" - Miranda Lambert, written by Miranda Lambert & Blake Shelton
"Springsteen" - Eric Church, written by Eric Church, Jeff Hyde & Ryan Tyndell
"Wanted" - Hunter Hayes, written by Hunter Hayes & Troy Verges
My thoughts? I was pleasantly surprised to see "A Woman Like You" nominated; I didn't see that one coming at all. This category is a little strange for me though. I really don't know what else to say about it.
My pick? I'm torn between "A Woman Like You" and "Springsteen". Both really strong songs, I think they're the best written of the bunch. "Springsteen" has a better chance of winning, but I'm going to be different and pick "A Woman Like You". Because this song doesn't seem to get the love that the others do.
My prediction? The obvious choice would probably be "Over You" and the fact that it feels like the obvious might actually hurt its chances. It'd be stupid for me to rule it out, so I won't. But I'm going to call it for "Springsteen". I'm pretty certain that it's going to be one or the other.
Video of the Year *This award is unfortunately given off camera
The nominees: "Creepin"- Eric Church, directed by Peter Zavadil
"Merry Go Round" - Kacey Musgraves, directed by Perry Bean
"Tornado" - Little Big Town, directed by Shane Drake
"Wanted" - Hunter Hayes, directed by Traci Goudie & Patrick Hubik
"We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together" - Taylor Swift, directed by Declan Whitebloom
"The Wind" - Zac Brown Band, directed by Mike Judge
My thoughts? Honestly my first thought was why there were six videos nominated instead of the usual five. But whatever. Interesting group of videos; a couple of odd choices in there.
My pick? Easy. "Creepin'" by Eric Church. I love everything about this video. Peter Zavadil is one of my favorite video directors and this song is just so different and out there. It was so important that the video reflect that and it totally did. Fantastic video. That shot of Eric standing on the barricade they built on the track and lifting up his lantern is probably my favorite shot ever. Peter Zavadil is the man.
My prediction? I think this one is going to go to "Tornado".
Vocal Event of the Year *Just like Video, this one is given off camera. Also unfortunately
The nominees" "Don't Rush" - Kelly Clarkson featuring Vince Gill
"Easy" - Rascal Flatts featuring Natasha Bedingfield
"Feels Like a Rock Star" - Kenny Chesney duet with Tim McGraw
"Let It Rain" - David Nail featuring Sarah Buxton
"The Only Way I Know" - Jason Aldean with Luke Bryan & Eric Church
My thoughts? As much as I like "Easy" and "Let It Rain", I don't understand how they got nominated considering that they were both released in 2011. That doesn't make any sense to me.
My pick? "The Only Way I Know". Does this surprise anyone? Three of my favorite artists together on one song? Come on. Such an easy choice for me.
My prediction? This is a battle between "Feels Like a Rock Star" and "The Only Way I Know". The other songs really don't stand a chance here. These are five of the biggest country stars around. Kenny and Tim have both been popular longer, but the other three dominated in 2012. So I gotta call it for "The Only Way I Know".
There are actually a whole lot of other categories, but they aren't featured on either the broadcast or the red carpet. The winners of those awards have already been announced anyway. For anyone interested, you can find the complete list of nominees here. And you can find the list of early ACM winners here. If you check out the winners link, you'll see that they give out awards to the best instrumentalists of the year and if you ask me, I think they should take all of the musicians who won and give them something to perform on the show. It'll probably never happen, but I think it'd be awesome. These musicians are so important to country music and they deserve to be featured every now and then. These people deserve our respect and appreciation. Especially since they're all so very talented.
But yeah, this wraps up my ACM thoughts, picks and predictions. Feel free to share YOUR thoughts, picks and prediction via profanity free comment. I'd really love to know who you all are rooting for, what performance you're looking forward to, you who think deserved a nomination but didn't get one and so on. Don't forget to get your votes in for Entertainer and New Artist of the year at voteacm.com once a day through April 7th. Remember that the ACMs are this Sunday, April 7th, on CBS at 8PM Eastern with the red carpet being shown on GAC beforehand, starting at 6:30PM Eastern. As usual, I'll be live tweeting (@countrymusicATK) during the show along with who knows how many other country fans. I've said it before: twitter is a very interesting place to be on award show nights. It's worth checking out - though if you've never experienced it, brace yourself. Emotions can run pretty high on there and fan battles are pretty much a given. In the meantime, I'm hoping to get another post or two up between now and then. We'll see what happens.
Thanks for reading!
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