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Andy Sullivan: Against the Grain

The 50th anniversary of the ACM Awards were held Sunday night April 19.  The show, hosted by Blake Shelton and Luke Bryan.  Fifty years ago, the ACM’s Most Promising male vocalist was Merle Haggard.  The show kicked off with a tribute to Merle in the form of Eric Church and Keith Urban’s “Pledge Allegiance to the Hag”. That was actually a 2006 Eric Church song.  Keith then launched into his new track “Raise Em Up”. 
Blake and Luke then came out for the open.  They announced that the ACM’s that night were the most attended awards show of all time.  That was bound to happen when you’re in the new, huge Cowboys Stadium.  With 21 ACM Awards over 4 decades and winning Entertainer of the Year in each of those four decades, George Strait was introduced to perform “All My Exes Live in Texas” and “Let It Go”. George Strait will always be cool.  End of story.  He was then presented with the very first ACM Milestone Award.
Next was Florida Georgia Line performing “Sippin’ on Fire” which sounded like every other FGL song. I move on.  Song of the Year went to Miranda Lambert for “Automatic”.  They also gave recognition to Randy Travis, who was in attendance, for his 1987 hit “I Told You So”.  Sam Hunt(the artist, not the retired teacher) totally confused me with his country-rap shtick.  I’d say this is usually when I turn the station on my radio but I hardly listen to much, if any, “country” radio these days.  Tony Romo told a dated deflated ball joke before introducing Dierks Bentley performing “Riser”.  Vocal Duo of the Year went to Florida Georgia Line.  Next, please.
Martina McBride performed “Independence Day”. I did enjoy the 50th anniversary performances such as this one.  One of the small morsels of enjoyment I’d get out of this show.  Luke Bryan’s performance was a speed-bump on the way to Miranda Lambert performing “Mama’s Broken Heart” and “Little Red Wagon”.  Both get a thumbs up from me.  She then received a Milestone trophy for being the most awarded female in the history of the Academy.  Alabama, who apparently is now a trio, presented Little Big Town with Vocal Group of the Year.  Well deserved.
Jason Aldean performed.  That’s basically interchangeable with “Luke Bryan performed” or “Florida Georgia Line performed”.  As Bon Jovi once sang, “It’s all the same.  Only the names have changed”.  Kelly Clarkson introduced Reba to perform “Is There Life Out There”, “The Night The Lights Went out ibn Georgia”, and “Fancy”.  Great stuff! Then she performed a new song, “Going Out Like That”.  Kelly presented Reba with a Milestone Award for winning Female Vocalist a record 7 times. 
Little Big Town performed their new hit “Girl Crush”.  I like the song.  There was a whole dust-up when it was released about stations not playing the song because what they felt it represented.  Whatever.  I also like Meghan Linsey version of the song that she sang on The Voice.
Taylor Swift’s mom presented her with a Milestone Award.  I wondered how many Milestone Awards they were going to give out on that night.  And if you were wondering, yes I believe that was Taylor’s respectful “adios” speech to country.  Christina Aguilera and Rascal Flatts performed a good Tivo speed-through song.  Garth Brooks was the next recipient of an ACM Milestone Award. Nancy O’Dell introduced the late Chris Kyle’s wife Tea.  They in turn introduced Garth performing his military inspired hit “All American Kid".  Classic Garth! He was awarded a Milestone for the most awrded Entertainer of the Year.
New Artist of the Year went to Cole Swindell.  Female Vocalist went to Miranda Lambert.  Eric Church presented the Milestone Award for the academy’s first fan voted Entertainer of the Year to Kenny Chesney.  Single Record of the Year went to Lee Brice for “I Don’t Dance”.  Trisha Yearwood presented Male Vocalist of the Year to Jason Aldean.  Whatever you think, ACM’s.  Alan Jackson performed what is probably the most emotional country song of the past 20 years, “Where Were You When The World Stopped Turning”. 
Brad Paisley performed his new song “Crushin’ It”.  Keith Urban introduced 16x ACM winners, 8 in a row for top vocal duo, Brooks & Dunn performing “My Maria”.  You can’t not like this song.  Well, I guess you can. I find it rather impossible, though.  Keith presented them with the milestone award for the greatest duo in country music history.  Little known fact, B&D’s very first award was an ACM.  ‘
Luke Bryan won Entertainer of the Year.  Brad Paisley and Darius Rucker(awesome and sorely underappreciated, btw), closed the show with the Ray Charles classic “Let The Good Times Roll”. 
I did enjoy all the history and most of the performances at the show.  It was a fairly decent show I suppose.  But don’t get me started about Nick Jonas performing on a country show!

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