Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Today's Country Tidbits

The ACM Honors award show was last night in Nashville. Martina McBride, Randy Travis, Kenny Rogers, John Rich and Buxton Hughes all performed during the evening. The night is a relaxed party for the winners of the non-televised Academy of Country Music award-winners, and has been held in Nashville for the past four years, in spite of the fact that the ACM is based in southern California.

We now know the stars who'll be featured in the Nashville school re-build on "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition." Carrie Underwood we already knew about, but add Keith Urban and a singer more famous for her tabloid escapades than for country music lately, LeAnn Rimes. Leigh Anne Tuohy of "The Blind Side" fame was part of Ty Pennington's design crew, and they all spent last week in Nashville for the build. The episode is tentatively scheduled for November 7th, just before the CMA Awards air on the 10th.

Wanna fly across the country from New York to LA with Taylor Swift on the day her cd drops? You can, with her "Speak Now"contest. Come up with 40 or fewer perfect words to win...good luck!

Just get set to ice down your credit card - today, there's new music available from Zac Brown Band, Billy Currington and Randy Houser. Next Tuesday, Kenny Chesney's "Hemingway's Whiskey" and Montgomery Gentry's greatest hits package are released, in two weeks, Toby Keith unloads with "Bullets in the Gun" and in three weeks there are new releases from Trace Adkins and Darius Rucker. A month from today, Sugarland is out with a new cd, then the following Tuesday is Taylor Swift's turn. The first Tuesday in November, Jason Aldean and Brad Paisley have elected to release new projects, then it's Reba's turn, Rascal Flatts and Keith Urban on the 16th and Alan Jackson on the 23rd of November. Told you your credit card would be smokin'!!

Congratulations to Lady Antebellum, who have the number one country song again this week with "Our Kind of Love."

Happy birthday to Faith Hill, who turns 43 today.

The tweet of the day is from James Otto, responding to Miranda Lambert's lavish praise of his show: "Love @Miranda_Lambert for her kind words but I still really wanted that gig. Miranda I promise to suck next time."