Today's Country Tidbits

Congrats to Blake Shelton, who has #1 song number 6 with "Hillbilly Bone." When he first heard the song, he thought it would make a great Trace Adkins song, so he passed on it. Then he put it on hold and asked Trace to sing back-up vocals. Then he decided it needed to be a full-on duet featuring both of them, and that effort got Blake his latest spot at the top of the charts.

Fun facts from the "American Saturday Night" tour: Brad Paisley played to nearly 1.2 million fans in 8 months on the road. The band went through 12,840 guitar picks, 3,570 AA batteries, over a thousand packs of guitar strings, 74 cowboy hats and had two babies born at shows along the way. His "H2O World Tour" dates will be announced within a week.

Steel Magnolia will be opening on Brad's next tour, and they're off to a great start with their first single, "Keep On Lovin' You." It's the highest debut song by a male/female duo in Billboard's Top Country Single chart history. They've come up with a way to interact with their fans each week. “We actually do this thing now that’s called Talk to Us Tuesdays and by way of MySpace blog we have fans submit questions and we answer them every Tuesday by way of video blog. It gives us a chance to interact with our fans and kinda tell them what’s going on and just kind of good interaction you know.”

Justin Moore is singing the praises of the guy who stole his guitar last Saturday night. The guy who took the guitar got an attack of conscience and returned it the next morning, complete with a note of apology inside the guitar case, saying it was a drunken mistake. The note went on to say, "I would like to deeply and sincerely apologize for what I've done. I'm going out and buying 50 of your CDs today." Justin Moore says, "We all make mistakes, but we don't always make it right. It says a lot about the guy."

Carrie Underwood is getting a little push-back from fans of her fiance, Mike Fisher. When she visits his homeland, she says people are usually pretty nice, but occasionally, hockey fans will come up and warn her that she'd better not try to take Mike away from Canada. The couple plans to divide their time between Nashville and Ottowa, as they're doing now.

Wanna see how Carrie Underwood's "Play On" show opens? Check this out.



And that flying over the audience thing? It's in a blue pickup truck.



Dierks Bentley has announced his "Up On the Ridge" tour dates and stops. He kicks off the bluegrass-tinged fun on April 21 in Portland, Oregon.

Love And Theft have been invited to help with the grand opening of the NASCAR Hall of Fame in Charlotte, NC on May 11th. The free day of festivities includes a concert in the evening, with Love And Theft as the headliners. The executive director of the NASCAR Hall of Fame saw them at a show in Nashville and was blown away, hence the invitation.

Keith Urban and Nicole Kidman were in Australia this past weekend, celebrating Nicole's Mom's 70th birthday.

New music out today includes "Sunday in the Country," a compilation album of inspirational songs that's a benefit for the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. It includes music from Keith Urban, Martina McBride, George Strait and many more Nashville greats. Brantley Gilbert's "Halfway to Heaven" and Travis Rush's "Feel" are also out today.

Patty Griffin is on the "Late, Late Show with Craig Ferguson" tonight, Craig Morgan is on "Hannity" tomorrow and Gary Allan is on "Jimmy Kimmel Live" show tomorrow night.