Tonight is the Grammy Nominations Concert Live!! special on CBS, and Luke Bryan is honored to be part of the fun: “Anytime you’re associated with the Grammys it’s pretty cool. We’re honored to be associated and do the show. So we’re going to get up there and do our stuff and have a good time.” Taylor Swift co-hosts with LL Cool J, and in addition to Luke, Dierks Bentley, Hunter Hayes and The Band Perry will perform. It’s on at 10pm Eastern tonight on CBS.
Another Taylor Swift/Harry Styles spotting happened over the weekend. Taylor and the One Direction member were spotted sightseeing in Central Park, and wandering through the Central Park Zoo in New York City. Wonder if she’s started writing a song about him yet?
Rascal Flatts certainly has a huge fan base, but the guys are fans of country artists themselves. According to Jay DeMarcus, “Jason Aldean has really been tearing it up – and Little Big Town. We had them out on the road with us, and we’re such huge fans of those guys and what they’re doing right now. It’s so good when you see good people doing well.” They’ll get to celebrate country music alongside people they admire this Saturday night during the CMT Artist of the Year special.
Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood are in Haiti, helping out on a Habitat for Humanity build. It’s the second time they’ve been to the island nation to help rebuild after the earthquake in 2010. Their goal on this trip is to help build over 100 new homes as part of the 29th Annual Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter Work Project.
It was Kimberly Schlapman’s brother-in-law who died Thanksgiving week, causing the band to cancel or reschedule several tour dates. Andy Schlapman was struck by a drunk driver in Nashville, where he, his wife and their daughter were visiting. In a post on Little Big Town’s website, Kimberly wrote, “This is a part of life that one never imagines or plans for. It has been very difficult to accept.”
Have you listened to the new Florida Georgia Line cd yet? The debut album includes the #1 song, “Cruise,” and according to band member Brian Kelley, not all of it is original material: “We actually cut four or five outside songs that we didn’t write. If you didn’t look at the liner notes, I think our fans and people would think we wrote them just because they’re right up our alley. They are songs we believe in, and felt a connection with, and songs that we felt like we were doing something wrong if we didn’t cut them.”
Kip Moore’s video for the song “Beer Money” includes a true-to-life scene – him being fired from a job. Kip wanted that scene, because: “That wasn’t in the original piece, ‘cause I thought about how I wanted the whole video to flow and the story, and at the end of it, I said, ‘Let’s go back and let’s do this opening scene like this,’ because that’s how so many of my jobs were. I was always trying to write songs while I was at work or doing other songs, and I always had bosses getting on to me, especially the whole time I was here in Nashville.” Check out the video now…
