Thursday, February 2, 2012

Today's Country Tidbits

Lady Antebellum beat a record held by Kenny Chesney at the arena in Bloomington, Illinois this past weekend. They kicked off their tour by breaking the attendence record at US Cellular Coliseum, packing more than 32,000 fans into three shows. Charles Kelley says the trio are always looking for ways to get better: “It will be interesting, I think we’re gonna try to evolve now, after a third record. We really want to free ourselves up a little bit more and see where we can kind of go with the music and not get in too much of a stride, so to speak, where you just keep regurgitating the same type of music, so we want to try and push ourselves.”

Darius Rucker is touring with Lady Antebellum and has booked studio time to record in his down time. He's written most of the songs for his third country studio album, and says about his crazy schedule, “For me, it’s all really all about fun right now, so I’m just doing the best I can with that. And it’s really getting better and better every time I play, so I can’t...you know, I can’t complain about it.”

Reba is not just alive, she's poking fun at the rumors of her untimely demise. As reported here Tuesday, the top Google search Monday was "reba dead" as people sought details of her tragic fall from an Austrian mountain while filming a movie. She posted this on her WhoSay website yesterday:


Toby Keith and his family won, then lost, and now have won again a $2.8 million settlement in the 2001 death of his dad, H.K. Covel. Toby's dad was killed in a traffic accident, and the original trial found a bus company negligent in the wreck. The settlement was overturned when the bus company appealed, and now the Oklahoma Supreme Court has upheld the original verdict.

Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. When you're Taylor Swift, most of the time, you win, but not this time. She was up for a role in Les Miserables but lost it to a virtual unknown, Samantha Barks, a former contestant on "I'd Do Anything."

Congrats to Tim McGraw - "Emotional Traffic," the album he went to court to have released, debuts at #1 on the Billboard Country Chart and #2 on the Billboard 100 this week. It's his 13th #1 debut album, and his last project on his old record label, Curb Records. To what does he owe all those #1's? “Sometimes I know if I’m gonna go sing a song, I can spend all day in there and sing and at the end of the day, listen back to and not like anything I’ve done and have to start over the next day. But I’ve got to go do the best I can that day and wrap my mind around it in that way. If I’m successful most of the days, then the end result is gonna be success at the end of all of those things put together.”

The Grammy Awards get a little more country this year, as Dierks Bentley and Miranda Lambert have been added to the presenters. Previously announced Nashville denizens Taylor Swift, Jason Aldean, The Band Perry and Blake Shelton will be performing on the show, which airs live on Sunday, February 12 on CBS

Blake Shelton and the other judges from "The Voice" grace the cover of Rolling Stone Magazine this week. The second season premiers right after the Super Bowl Sunday night.

Tonight, Blake Shelton is on the Tonight Show With Jay Leno.

The tweet of the day is from Reba: "Well, it's a great week when you find out you're NOT dead and everyone at ABC LOVES the pilot script, "Malibu Country""