If you walk into a writing room in Nashville on Music Row, you’ll hear the same song written every single day. We never get out of Nashville. We never get off of Music Row. When there’s 1000 songs written per day on Music Row, how many different songs can there be? They’re not. It’s the same beat, it’s the same melody, it’s the same words, it’s the same rhyme. It’s “truck” and “duck” and “muck.” It’s the same thing over and over. ●
- – Jimmy Wayne thinks songwriters should get out there and live some new experiences worth writing about.

I know this won’t be popular, but I hate the Lady A line ‘I’m a little drunk and I need you now’ from [the five week country No. 1 and pop crossover hit] ‘Need You Now.’ I think the word ‘drunk’ is so… vulgar. How about the words ‘gone’ or ‘lost?’ It would still convey the same sentiment. ●
- – Dawn Behnken, morning co-host at WFGE (Froggy 101) in State College, PA, finds the mention of drunkenness in a country song to be vulgar. In other words, Lady Antebellum is a little too outlaw for her.

CONTINUING BLUEGRASS GRAMMY ATTACK ADS: Thile and Daves, simply put, are pansies. ●
- – In preparation for the Grammys, Steve Martin has been tweeting attack ads aimed at some of his competitors in the Best Bluegrass Album category. Like Chris Thile and Michael Daves.

LAST BLUEGRASS GRAMMY ATTACK AD: Jim Lauderdale couldn’t play his way out of a paper bag. Especially one made of reinforced steel. ●
- – And Jim Lauderdale.

Wait until you see the album cover for new artist Casey James. Whee! He’s purty! ●
- – CMT’s Hazel Smith with some typically insightful commentary.

I wasn’t that good at socializing. I’m still not. ●
- – Ronnie Dunn.

I was 19 when I got in line for “American Idol.” Nobody knows who they are at 19; you’re not supposed to. I did this whole thing backwards. You come off a show like “Idol” and you’re a celebrity, but for what? You don’t have a song on the radio, you don’t have an album out. You’ve been singing cover songs and you haven’t done anything really. You have to develop backwards as an artist. Become a celebrity first and figure out “what kind of artist am I and where do I belong?” ●
- – Kellie Pickler on entering the music business via “Idol.”

So each guy has a different area of responsibility. I am not a very technical guy, I even struggle sometimes to answer emails. And I’m not on Twitter … so my role, and I think it originally happened because of my voice, but my role in the group is the kind of old-fashioned thing, it’s to do most of the interviews. ●
- – Oak Ridge Boy Richard Sterban explains why he’s almost always the one you hear from in interviews. As for the rest of the chore wheel: Joe Bonsall and Duane Allen handle tweeting and Facebooking, respectively, while William Lee Golden focuses mostly on beard maintenance.

People keep asking me, ‘What is country music?’ And so I tell them, ‘This is.’ ●
- – Emmylou Harris introducing “Old Five and Dimers Like Me” in concert.

Would I like to have airplay? Well, I’d be a fool and a liar to say no. But I am having fun. I’m creative, and I don’t have to watch my words or watch what I say. I don’t feel that pressure to go suck up to somebody, whether it’s radio or the record company. ●
- – Lorrie Morgan on having her major label days (most likely) behind her.

There were some on-sales through the fan club that I would say half to 60% of the tickets we were offering were being picked up by brokerage companies. They were joining en masse. If [brokers] didn’t go to the fan club and waited on the [general] on-sale, I can handle aspects of that. But they infiltrate the fan club and get pit tickets or front row tickets that we want our fans to have first shot at for being members of the Church Choir, they come in and scoop them up and mark them up thousands of percentage points and come back and try to sell them to the same fan, that’s the part that bothers me the most. If we wanted our tickets to be high we would have made ‘em high. ●
- – Ticket resellers have been joining Eric Church’s fan club to get access to heaps of tickets at discounted fan rates. Church’s camp isn’t too happy about it.

Basically, it’s a collection of very country songs. ●
- – Darrell Scott on his new album, Long Ride Home.

When I came to Nashville, there were not that many of us writing songs for a living. Most of us wrote by ourselves. Back in those days, we were so restricted to who we could write with because they wouldn’t split copyrights. Lord knows ASCAP wouldn’t split things with BMI and vice versa, so you had to write with people in your own camp. Those walls have come down. Now we can write with anybody and everybody will split copyrights. It has opened up a whole world of freedom for songwriting. ●
- – Bill Anderson puts a positive spin on Nashville’s turn toward co-writing.

This is a comeback, period. I’ve been gone for three or four years and I wanted this record to come out of the box and be as big or as good as Not A Moment Too Soon by McGraw. That was my goal. ●
- – For his next album, Chris Cagle is setting his sights as high as “Refried Dreams.” Elsewhere in the interview, he expresses his love of “southern rock and slammin’ country” of the type recorded by Jason Aldean and Brantley Gilbert. Getting excited for his return yet?

I know I don’t look like the type that would know all that old-school country stuff. … One night I bet a man $10 a song for every Haggard song I could play. He’d put $300 in that tip jar before he finally just gave up and left. ●
- – Thompson Square’s Keifer Thompson knows his Haggard. I wouldn’t have guessed.

People want to know what they’re going to be listening to before they hear it. And that’s so funny because it’s so easy to listen to music, and you’d think that people would just be more willing to listen to things without having to hear about it first. But, comparisons are funny, because like you said, all they really do is either burden you or make you feel like you have to work towards something that you never really thought you’d have to. You can’t really progress towards that comparison. You have to progress as your own artist. If you start to feel pressure about becoming that artist, it starts to affect the original vision of what you set out to do. ●
- – Caitlin Rose feels ill-served by comparisons to other singer-songwriters.

I mean, there are so many songwriters in this town. I don’t mind if I come to the car and you put a CD in my windshield wiper. I’m like, “Great!” I love to hear new stuff. I don’t want to hear the same stuff all the time. I love hearing music that people have sat down and poured their soul into. It’s fresh, it’s different and I’ve never heard it before. You never know, there could be a hit on there. ●
- – How much stuff do you think Kellie Pickler will start getting under her wiper blades NOW?

So during dinner I’m nodding a lot and making the proper facial expressions during conversations, really trying to contribute. Then I’d think, I should say something about this particular topic, so I’d write it down. And just about the time I got it written down and was about to hold it up to share it, the conversation would move on to another topic. So I’d write faster and people would say, ‘I can’t read that.’ ●
- – Keith Urban on vocal rest.

I’m a dainty musician. ●
- – Lady Antebellum’s Charles Kelley on fracturing his pinky. By bumping it against the edge of a table.

Is Richie Law the Next Scotty McCreery? ●
- – Taste of Country headline about some guy on the new season of American Idol. Can we please not start talking about the ‘next’ Scotty McCreery until we’ve managed to rid ourselves of the current one? Thanks.

Maybe some people who have a more commercial sound and know the business, that’s OK, but if you have something to say, you have to find a way to say it. I want to be as successful as possible, but I don’t want to change what I want to say, and how to say it to be there. Dwight Yoakam and The Dixie Chicks made great records with great integrity, so that’s a big role model for me. ●
- – Miranda Lambert on trusting her instincts.

Faith is an amazing thing. When you’re in a town with all these people who could change your life and they’re not doing anything about it, that’s where faith comes in. And yes, it’s frustrating, but I felt in my heart my whole life [that I was] drawn to Nashville, even as a kid. I figured I’d kick around until they kicked me out or gave me a chance. You get your hopes up at different times, and it kind of just drags you along. In misery. ●
- – Jerrod Niemann on lean years in Nashville.

They’re just kind of a nasty bunch of hillbillies, and I just got sick of it. So I wrote them a song, which is the most time-honored way of answering stuff, you know, particularly in country music. ●
- – Robert Earl Keen on “The Road Goes On and On,” his love letter to Toby Keith’s posse.

The “Nashville Sound” is not today’s country music, but great producers remain, among them Tony Brown, Frank Rogers, Keith Stegall and Frank Liddell. Others, like Don Cook, Buddy Cannon, Dann Huff and James Stroud, choose to hack it out factory style, focusing solely on giving radio what it wants, not showing what a singer can do (it’s possible to do both). ●
- – Rich Kienzle in a posting titled “How Nashville Producers Got the Power.”

I find there are so many people, they’re so bound to the idea of that tradition that you grow up to get married and have babies. There’s nothing wrong with that. That’s wonderful, that’s the dream. It doesn’t work out for everyone. Some people are in their 40s, 50s and 60s and they haven’t found the one, and they’re not going to settle. There’s no expiration date to find true love. ●
- – Terri Clark on her song “The One.”

Radio is a beast that has to be fed, and he’s a guy who’s at a point in his career where every lick matters. This is an important album in his career because he needs to continue to have hit singles. ●
- – Wade Jessen, Billboard’s senior chart manager, on Dierks Bentley’s return to mainstream country following the grassy detour of “Up on the Ridge.” Bentley’s new album hits stores February 7.

West acknowledged he’s a big fan of Nelson and wanted to capitalize on a golden chance to perform for such a noted “captive audience.”
“Willie loved the song, he is a real outgoing individual” he added. ●
- – Hudspeth County, Texas, county commissioner Wayne West used the opportunity of prosecuting Willie Nelson on marijuana charges to… play him a self-written song. A captive audience, indeed.

Taylor will probably win, just because she’s in here. Let’s give her an award for filling up stadiums. I know Jason [Aldean] wants to win this, but he likely won’t. He picks great songs, but it’s getting old; you can’t tell them apart anymore. Eric [Church]‘s too hotheaded. But Lady A has done a great job of being right down the middle – they’re like the Black Eyed Peas of country music.
- – In the latest (Feb 3-10) issue of Entertainment Weekly, an unnamed country star who’s a “Nashville crossover with several Grammys already in his trophy case” thinks a Best Country Album win for Lady Antebellum is in order. Thanks to Carolyn for the tip.

In case you missed it, a bunch of smart folks (plus yours truly) commented on 2011 in country music for the Nashville Scene’s 12th Annual Country Music Critics’ Poll. It makes for pretty good reading.

Three unique families will step into the spotlight as Bayou Billionaires, My Big Redneck Vacation and Swanderosa premiere on CMT this weekend. ●
- – CMT continues its focus on non-music programming…

1,071 views, 100% thumbs down ●
- – … not a popular move, judging from the stats reported at the bottom of the posting.

Stephanie Renae had just turned 15, but she did a grown-up version of Underwood’s “Inside Your Heaven,” and she did it well. I think I loved her for her song choice more than anything because it makes me think her country side may go pretty deep. ●
- – Alison Bonaguro on American Idol. Familiarity with “Inside Your Heaven,” the finale song of Carrie Underwood, suggests a deep knowledge of country music? If you say so.

I didn’t go in the studio thinking, ‘What will country radio play?’ I really dove into this record and I didn’t hold back and I fought. I didn’t pick and choose my battles. I fought all of them. And I got most of them. ●
- – Kellie Pickler on 100 Proof, out on Tuesday.

He is so versatile and so appreciated for all of the things that he has done. The fact that he shines in songwriting, shines in his solo career, shines in movies and does it all so tastefully. I got to meet him last year, and he’s just one of those people who has been in this business for years but you can tell it hasn’t chewed him up and spit him out. He just seemed like the human embodiment of gratitude. Sometimes you see these people who are just so—God—so affected by all of it, where ambition has taken precedence over happiness. But when I meet people who really embody this serenity of knowing that they have had an amazing life. . . . They just seem to be effervescent. ●
- – Taylor Swift on Kris Kristofferson.

EVANS, NY– Evans Police and New York State Park Police are warning people about a Craigslist scam advertising a concert this summer.
Investigators say the posting is dated 1-15-12 and advertises a country music concert to be held at Evangola State Park between July 13, 2012-July 15, 2012. The poster asked vendors for $1,000 to reserve their spot.
Officials say there is no concert. ●
- – So, uh, you might want to do some research before sending large amounts of money to random people on Craigslist. Go figure.

On Monday, a trial gets under way in Davidson County Probate Court to decide the proper division of the income from Reeves’ royalties — which earn as much as $400,000 annually for the estate of the late singer best known for the lyric “Put your sweet lips a little closer to the phone.” ●
- – Jim Reeves still brings in up to $400,000 per year. Not bad for a guy who has been dead since 1964.

This is little more than a stylistic (albeit crude) way of saying that should you require something more substantial than a plastic cup, you are not a man.
ORLY?
Well, you know who disagrees with that statement. Jean Claude Motherf*ckin’ Van-Damme, that’s who. ●
- – Shea Serrano at LA Weekly’s West Coast Sound blog, in a posting titled “Toby Keith’s ‘Red Solo Cup’: Why This Song Sucks.”

Someone said to me one time, ‘You know, you can drive from Maine to San Diego, and you can get there in a car with headlights that only shine 30 feet in front of you.’ That’s how it feels: It feels like I’m going, but I can’t really see the specifics. Mostly what I think I’ve learned after decades of doing this, is if I have the courage to stay in touch with what really moves me, that is my best chance for moving other people and staying connected with an audience. ●
- – Kathy Mattea on making her way in the music business.

C-o-u-n-t-r-y, that’s kind of like part of the hook, and that became the name of the song — spelling out the word country. It’s one of the most fun songs we’ve ever written. It’s one of those songs we didn’t think about it a lot. It’s not really deep lyrics, but it’s got country roots, and it talks about our country and how much we love country music and how much we love the country lifestyle. That’s what it’s all about for us. ●
- – LoCash Cowboy Preston Brust on the duo’s new single. Sounds pretty enticing, right?

Once a decision was made to go forward, that record probably came together easier than any Dierks Bentley record had before because that’s where he lives creatively. ●
- – Mike Dungan says “Up on the Ridge” came naturally.

[Lee] Brice says he and a few other people were asleep at the time. He says they left the bus “and within of minutes it was in flames.” ●
- – Good news for Lee Brice: You and your bandmates escaped a bus fire yesterday in Arizona. Bad news for Lee Brice: You were quoted, or misquoted, by the AP sounding like a goober. Within of minutes?

Throughout the documentary, Chely, a devout Christian, showed great concern for young gay kids who face the difficult reality that they are perceived as “an abomination” and not even worthy of being alive. These kids are the motivating factor of why she may have committed career suicide. Her last CD sold less than any previous album she had ever released. ●
- – Look, I’m sure the Chely Wright documentary is indeed wonderful, but can we stop pretending that Lifted Off the Ground wouldn’t have been her worst-selling album if she had stayed in the closet? That’s sort of what happens when you go a decade without any big hits: successive albums are less successful. If anything, the publicity around her coming out probably helped cushion the drop by boosting her sales numbers a bit.

He said, ‘Oh, I’m not really sure I like that one.’ ●
- – Miranda Lambert recounts Blake Shelton’s reaction to “Dear Diamond” being the first song she wrote after they got engaged.

Keith [Urban] had called me a couple times when the record first came out and said, ‘Man, this is hands down song of the year.’ He’ll even text me and say, ‘I’m listening to the song.’ ●
- – Ronnie Dunn. If you’re in love with “Cost of Livin,” you are not alone.

All of Tim McGraw’s fans — and there are millions of them — will be pleased to know that his Emotional Traffic album will finally be released by Curb Records on Jan. 24. ●
- – Hazel Smith has somehow managed to not hear about the fact that album is only being released now to spite McGraw (and milk a few more dollars out of him) as he leaves Curb.

I used to resist a lot of that, but I’m trying to open my mind more about it, and I’m getting better about meeting them somewhere in the middle. But I’m not giving up my boots or Wranglers. People have asked me to put on a pair of slacks, khakis, or dress pants, and it’s not going to happen.
- – Blake Shelton, in Redbook, on listening to image consultants.

I’m actually getting to write with Rhett Akins now and it’s an awesome feeling. It’s kinda surreal. ●
- – Brantley Gilbert (“Dirt Road Anthem”) is writing with Rhett Akins (“Take a Back Road”). If those words don’t send cold chills down your spine, I don’t know what will.

You certainly don’t hear any country music on pop radio today. ●
- – Say what, Jimmy Webb?

… if she told them all to go to the bathroom, they’d all go to the bathroom. If she told them all to go buy popcorn, they’d go buy popcorn. I’ve obviously not gotten to that point in my career where I can affect that many people. It’s been a long time since this guy’s played and I was 16 or 17 years old the last time I went and saw him, but the only person I’ve seen even remotely close to it is Garth [Brooks]. To have that many people almost in a trance. Fixated on her. Her work ethic and how much control she has over every tiny little detail definitely humbles you and makes you feel like you’re pretty worthless. ●
- – David Nail on Taylor Swift’s command of her fanbase.

I’m no trained actor. I’m not Phillip Seymour Hoffman or Johnny Depp. I’m probably not going to play a gay hairdresser, but if there is a character I think I can associate and identify with I’ll try to do it. ●
- – Trace Adkins on film roles. I think he owes it to himself to at least try the gay hairdresser thing.

I think that song is amazing because it has 16 lines and every fourth line ends with “the Streets of Baltimore,” so you have to rhyme everything with that. He gets the people from Tennessee all the way to Baltimore and all the way back, and everything happens in these 16 lines. It’s massive, the story, and it’s so fast and so streamlined. ●
- – Richard Julian (The Little Willies) fully endorses “The Streets of Baltimore.” It’s a good ‘un.

These guys are like girls to me and I’m like a guy to them. ●
- – Norah Jones, colorfully, on being the only girl in the band.

There are a lot of my peers that aren’t as country as I am, and there’s a lot of my peers influenced by other kinds of music. For me, I just grew up on country music, and that’s all I’m influenced by. I’ve been trying to listen to some other random stuff. Random that’s not Merle Haggard. It’s not anything in depth. It’s just a mixture of stuff. ●
- – Sunny Sweeney is all country, but trying to expand her palette.

I belong in a smaller room. My time touring with Faith was amazing, and I wouldn’t have wanted to miss a minute of it. They made us part of the family and part of the show and the audiences were incredible to me. But it’s hard to reach 15,000 people with what I do. I need to take it 200 at a time. I’d rather have everyone feel like we’re in some living room somewhere. ●
- – Lori McKenna feels more at home in intimate venues.

I had no idea it would be that popular. I think I underestimated the power of country music. ●
- – Show director of “Always… Patsy Cline,” a surprise hit for the Spartanburg (South Carolina) Little Theatre in 2011. They’re doing “Honky Tonk Angels” in 2012.

He just finished recording a new album around Thanksgiving that’s a bit of a departure from his usual acoustic-based, folk-flavored music. This collection uses a full band, including a Hammond B-3 organ, fiddle, drums and bass with Todd playing the electric guitar doing leads and rhythm. The album, Agnostic Hymns and Stoner Fables, comes out soon and contains a bunch of new songs for the world to ponder. ●
- – A few details on the next Todd Snider album.

We are writing the whole record from start to finish on our own, so that’s going to be different. There definitely still are the country music influences because that’s such a part of who we are. But some songs are more bluesy, some songs are very dark. There are a few gospel, tent-revival kind of songs. It’s going to be a really interesting sound. ●
- – And the next Secret Sisters album, too. Glad it’ll be all originals this time.

I’ve been doing this a long time. If I didn’t know what I was doing by now, it’d be a problem. ●
- – Merle Haggard takes compliments lightly.

At country music events, everyone’s so nice. But at pop events, everybody’s too cool for school. Nobody ever talks. I like the acts musically, but I don’t know anyone, which is weird ’cause I’ve been doing this for 10 years. ●
- – Kelly Clarkson on the difference between the country and pop worlds.

Nashville gets a reputation for being glossy country music, the top songs on radio — that’s what people think is Nashville. The amazing musicians and songwriters I know in Nashville are nothing like that. It’s a great landing ground, a great source of artistry, and it has nothing to do with that glossy thing. Some of my greatest friends and musicians make their own records and make art there. It’s a great town. ●
- – Shelby Lynne doesn’t have any beef with Nashville.

I see people like Martina [McBride] do it, and Faith [Hill] do it. I know it’s a possibility. I just maybe need to sit down with them and say, ‘How DO you do it?’ ●
- – Carrie Underwood on crushing beer cans against her forehead… I mean, balancing music and motherhood.

Is that so? There you go. You can’t win ‘em all. Maybe they’re R&B fans or something. You can’t please everybody. ●
- – Scotty McCreery, upon learning that his debut made Entertainment Weekly’s list of the five worst albums of 2011.

As in, I only wear baggy, shapeless clothing starting at Thanksgiving and continuing through the first week of January….when I finally have had enough and resolve to get back on track. Which, for me, means making healthy choices about food, starting a workout program, saying no to that 2nd (ok, maybe 3rd) glass of wine, and trying to get more sleep. ●
- – Wearing sweatpants, eating nothing but bratwurst, imbibing a little too much, staying up all night… Thanksgiving through just after New Years, Martina actually IS DrunkenMartina.

I see guys today that are great songwriters, but I don’t see anyone else writing like Townes. Hayes Carll comes close, and he will get closer. ●
- – Jack Ingram thinks Hayes Carll might be the closest thing to a modern Townes Van Zandt.

When I turned the guys in my band, who’re even younger than me, onto Ghost on the Canvas (Glen’s final recording), they didn’t really know who he was. Now it’s something every one of them is suggesting we play on the bus. ●
- – Not knowing of Glen Campbell doesn’t say much for the guys in David Nail’s band, does it? Wonder how long before Nail lets them know that Campbell also made a few recordings pre-”Ghost on the Canvas.”

For two hours each night of the tour they can be taken away from reality – literally. ●
- – Pretty sure Brad Paisley has misunderstood the meaning of ‘literal.’ Do his concerts actually take place in some alternate dimension?

He wasn’t an outlaw, he was a good dad. It was just a term. It was like ‘I’m gonna wear pajamas inside the house. Outside, I’m a derelict.’ ●
- – Shooter on Waylon.

They have tried to get me on that ever since it started, even before this movie, and I said, “ARE YOU INSANE!?” [laughs] ●
- – Dolly Parton on “Dancing with the Stars.” I’d watch.

Oh, man, the new [album] is REALLY country — old country, with pedal steel and lots of twangy slide guitar — Brent Mason (the 12-time Academy of Country Music Guitarist of the Year who’ll be with Lewis for Saturday’s show) went crazy on his stuff. ●
- – Aaron Lewis is hoping Brent Mason made him country enough. Not sure it works that way.

The racist atmosphere at TAMC [Tripler Army Medical Center in Honolulu] was heavy. A white sergeant, listening to country music, menacingly told an African-American coworker, ‘That’s the kind of music we listen to when we jump off the back of the truck and chase you boys through the woods!’ ●
- – Exhibit A: Why people hate country music.

If I have a song idea, it’s almost something that I want to keep to myself. I feel like a co-writer comes in and says ‘We can do this or we can do that,’ and it’s really too early. I haven’t processed the idea in my own head enough, so I feel like it interrupts the process. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve let go of that some, and realized that the co-written songs are just a different thing. ●
- – Gretchen Peters on writing solo versus writing with collaborators.

I have a career that’s on a bit of autopilot in the sense that I feel I can rest easy a little bit more. I don’t feel that people are just going to leave me. They’re not going to just move on. We do well, and it’s a great feeling. ●
- – See, I wasn’t imagining it. Brad Paisley is definitely on autopilot. Has been since about 2005, I think.

It was kind of like what Forrest Gump said — ‘One less thing.’ I didn’t have worry about it. ●
- – Rory (of Joey +) simplified his life by choosing to wear overalls all the time. This is also why I always wear a scowl: just having the one facial expression saves me a lot of time and bother.

I’m kind of anti-label right now, but it depends, there’s new people coming up all the time that maybe won’t steal from you. That’s a real common thing. Now artists can make more money having your own label. We’re just tired of being stolen from all of our lives. ●
- – Tanya Tucker thinks the best you can hope for from a label is that they might not steal from you.

I mean, I can’t tell you what engine’s in what, and I certainly can’t pull it apart and put it back together. That would be pretty hopeless. But I’m a car buff in that I love the feeling of driving. ●
- – “In short,” Hunter Hayes clarified, “I’m not so much a car buff as I am a kid who knows how to drive and is sometimes photographed wearing lady shirts.”

Someone said once if you catch lightning in a bottle, you should probably bottle it up and run with it. ●
- – Nick Hoffman of new act The Farm. In fact, if you’ve already managed to catch the lightning in a bottle, there really isn’t much need to bottle it up. So you can skip right ahead to the running part.

He’s like a twisted jazz musician under all that country. He writes these chords that are just beautiful — the way they come together so simply, yet they go against normal forms that you learn as a musician. But he makes them sound so beautiful and simple. You don’t try to that, you just do. And that’s what’s great about Willie: he just does. ●
- – Norah Jones on Willie Nelson, the namesake of her country group. Which releases a new album, For the Good Times, next week.

I can’t stand any of it. It’s embarassing and I don’t even want to say I’m a country musician. We’re not God’s gift to Telecasters and pedal steels, by any means. We were a bunch of guys in a garage, but we live up to our inspirations and our mentors who set the bar just high enough. ●
- – Jason Boland on contemporary country.

Now, we’ve got to come out with another [single]. It’s a cycle. You’re always in a constant state of panic and worry, and hope you can hang on for one more song. [...] There is a misconception that if you’re on the radio, you’re rich beyond belief. I wish that was the case, but you spend so many years trying to get a deal. That took thirteen years, then you get one, and it’s a constant feeling of ‘Are we going to be gone tomorrow.’ I was talking with Jason Aldean about it, and we both said ‘If you ever lose that edge where you think it will never go away, that’s when it does. So, you can’t really get complacent about where you’re at. ●
- – Keifer Thompson (Thompson Square) makes life in a ‘new’ act seem pretty harrowing. If you read this in conjunction with the first quote up above, it sounds like he and Aldean are predicting the demise of Brad Paisley’s career.

It was almost like trying to do a wedding, a reception and a family reunion all in one day. I don’t want to be on TV like that unless I can help people. I don’t want to be another drama series of catastrophic events. They didn’t show a lot of the joy and celebration and laughter. I told them they blew it. ●
- – If she had it all to do over again, Wynonna might pass on the Oprah reality series.

a true punk, in the best sense of the word ●
- – Lucinda Williams on the late Charlie Louvin.

Click the bullet after each quote to visit the source.

If that ain’t country music then Waylon Jennings was a pop star! With so many people thinking that AC is the new country, when you hear real country, and that’s the music you love, you just go crazy as a listener, and that’s exactly what our audience at Y108 did. ●
- – WDSY (Y108) Pittsburgh’s Stoney Richards on Brantley Gilbert’s “Country Must Be Country Wide.” Glad our country airwaves are in such great hands.

Q: So we should talk about holiday music, which is almost as polarizing as say the collected works of Garth Brooks.
A: Nothing is that polarizing! ●
- – Raul Malo, cheekily, to the Riverfront Times.

Do you think that anyone in this town would ever write a disparaging review on Taylor Swift or another of their big acts? No. Everything in Nashville is all buddy buddy, friend friend, love you love you. Save the shit for behind closed doors. And that is great, but it doesn’t help everybody. There is nothing provocative in Nashville. No one has an opinion. And nobody picks a wall. Everyone plays it right down the middle. Because if you do step outside that zone, who’s going to buy the ads? ●
- – Jaron Lowenstein (of “and the Long Road to Love” infamy) has gone from pop singer to ‘country’ singer to Americana outsider critical of the Nashville system in the space of about two years. Um, okay.

Country music has changed. I came to Nashville in ’72 and people like Conway Twitty and Loretta Lynn cut the songs. They would hear a song, go in, cut it and it would be out the next week. Now it’s what I call “slow business” – they think about something for so long, they cut it, and then think about it again. ●
- – Singer/songwriter/guitarist and International Rockabilly Hall of Famer Billy Burnette.

In Nashville in the spring, you go out and your car windshield is covered in this yellow pollen. That is Lady Antebellum: They are everywhere. Their music is on every station. ●
- – Brad Paisley. Also like pollen, lots of people have an allergic reaction to their music.

If I had a twitter page, this afternoon I would tweet: “The Bees,” recorded by LeeAnn Womack and written by Natalie Hemby, stuns the spinal column and excites grief, awe, and collegial admiration. Thanks for the good work! ●
- – Come on, Robbie Fulks. Roundabout tweeting (“if I were one to tweet, I would tweet this”) isn’t playing fair. Just join the self-involved masses and tweet directly. Miley Cyrus does it!

“Boobs Grow,” Miley Cyrus Tweets ●
- – Crack reporting by Alison Bonaguro at CMT.com…

Jake Owen Tweets Video of Itchy Dog ●
- – … to be rivaled only by the crack reporting of Amy Sciarretto at Taste of Country.

2. ‘Old Alabama,’ Brad Paisley & Alabama
1. ‘I’m Gonna Love You Through It,’ Martina McBride ●
- – Oh, and AOL’s The Boot, here concluding their list of 2011′s best country songs. Really? Of all the songs to commend, these are the ones you’re going with? Well, there’s no accounting for taste.

Maybe you just sell [a Christmas album] for a month [each year], but you sell it for a month forever. You know how many copies of the Nat King Cole Christmas album I’ve bought over the years? I’ll bet 50. ●
- – Someone really needs to tell Phil Vassar that CDs aren’t single-use.

I could not make boys. After the last one, I said, ‘OK, God, I get it. I quit!’ ●
- – Trace Adkins on fathering five daughters.

In my writing process, in a tongue and cheek manner, I did use a lot of the clichéd phrases and stuff. But here is the difference: I wrote the f*cking song. It is 100 percent completely accurate to my life. Some f*cking guy with a creative mind didn’t come up with this song for a guy who could sing well, but who couldn’t write a song to save his life. The song is completely about my life in every way, shape and form. All of those clichés actually apply to me. ●
- – Aaron Lewis stages an unconvincing defense of his own clichéd songwriting.

What’s happened, and this is more [of] an observation than a criticism, is that country music has become 16-to-25 year-old people. They complained about me when I had my success that I was taking away from country music and doing pop but now there’s no one doing it anymore and it’s more of a rock and roll country. I love it and it’s very exciting. It’s good for the art form. The goal is to overcome my past because that’s not what country music is anymore. I have to find a way to be different enough. ●
- – Kenny Rogers isn’t one to judge.

I’ve had a lot of musical goals in my life, but getting Keith Urban to do one of my songs is one of my last ones. His talent amazes me. If he did just even one of my songs, I can die a happy man. ●
- – REO Speedwagon’s Kevin Cronin has a thing for Keith Urban.

I have felt for the longest time that a lot of our female artists right now in country music are not necessarily — I’m trying to think of the best way to put it — it’s almost like they’re afraid to be the age they are right now. ●
- – Sherrie Austin gives a good interview. I hope Reba’s ears are ringing.

I’m still getting used to not being the biggest guy in the room. I’m still getting used to not being the funny fat guy. I’m still funny, I’m just not funny because I’m fat. I’m funny because I’m funny. ●
- – “… also, I’m not all that funny.” Big Vinny of Trailer Choir is down 184 pounds, though, which is awesome.

Video of the Week: Joey + Rory sing a Christmas favorite on Music City Roots.

If there’s somebody that’s going to make me cry listening to them sing, it’s going to be Tammy Wynette. There’s something about the production then and the songs: They might not necessarily have been commercial, but they were real, and they hit a nerve, and they made you feel something. ●
- – Kellie Pickler. Of course, Wynette’s songs WERE commercial in their day, which is why they topped the charts consistently for more than a decade. They just don’t seem commercial now, in light of what has followed.

Like Brad Paisley’s “Old Alabama.” [Nashville Scene] is criticizing it, among other reasons, because it paints an unrealistic picture of women who are in the mood for love after hearing Alabama’s music. I know that’s a far-fetched notion, but I’d rather have my music have more fantasy than reality. ●
- – Alison Bonaguro lays it all out there.

You see a lot of kids out in the front row that used to be jumping up and down and having a good time, and they’re kind of distracted by their phones and their Twitter. And everybody’s got a camera on their phone, so they’re just taking pictures. Which is cool, but it’s hard to get people to live in the moment and just enjoy the show. They’ll post on Facebook like, “Oh, my god. We’re at the Reckless Kelly show! It’s amazing!” It’s like, “Well, post that later,” you know? ●
- – Willy Braun isn’t a huge fan of your technological gizmos at concerts.

I mean take somebody as standard as [Merle] Haggard. You might peg him down to blue collar, but blue collar changed in the ’60s, the ’70s and the ’80s. The ’60s was about prison and recovering from young mistakes, ’70s was about love and finding that, and ’80s was about mortality with Haggard and stuff. So it follows the rules of life, and you’ve got all those songs to choose from [if] he is an influence of yours. ●
- – Garth Brooks on Hag through the decades.

The strength of Rodney’s character is what allowed this to happen. In our business, not every day is a good day and there’s a lot of challenges and changes going on in the music industry including ours, so when an artist comes along and is appreciative, it’s pretty nice. Not every artist feels that way right now. ●
- – Mike Curb uses the opportunity of re-signing Rodney Atkins to take a veiled shot at Tim McGraw.

What I thought was just a conversation that we were going to make a record to fulfill a deal at the end of the day turned out to be a turning point in my life and my career and the way I view music again. I was at a very vulnerable time in my life, and even though they weren’t my words, I could relate to all of them because all of these men wrote about what they were living and that doesn’t really happen anymore because everyone is trying to focus on making a hit record and it can be very stale. I totally believe the reason why I did this record now is to see where I want to go in the future. ●
- – LeAnn Rimes on Lady & Gentlemen.

You can tell Guy cares about the lyrics. He ain’t gonna rush it. There’s not a wasted word at all. And it goes into your consciousness. Every word is important. Every word works. ●
- – Ray Wylie Hubbard on Guy Clark.

Lady Antebellum’s Hillary Scott Tweets Close-up Photo of Dog ●
- – Taste of Country redefines “news.”

I was astounded, because he comes across the stage to say hello and I was like “Aw, he’s so awesome. Like look at his outfit.” He had the most amazing little outfit on, and I was like, “That is a proper Grand Ole Opry outfit.” And I was just so excited about it. And then the show started and he was wearing a completely different thing. So it wasn’t actually his costume — it was just his clothes for the day [laughs]. ●
- – Brandi Carlile on meeting Little Jimmy Dickens at her Opry debut.

I think everything is so PC that it drives me up the wall. I don’t know if it’s because I’m Australian and we’re not PC. I think people worry about stuff that is just a waste of time. Just say it. I don’t know what people are so afraid of. That’s what great country music has always been about. I do think we overthink things. I know I did when I made my other records, so I’m not pointing fingers. You might offend some people, but you’re never going to get everybody. It never occurred to me that you are not going to please every single person. There are people who don’t like the Beatles, so just do what you do. ●
- – Sherrie Austin thinks you should just be yourself.

Country radio isn’t all that enthusiastic about outsiders who didn’t cut their teeth in the country world. The support is there but not so far as the machine, so to speak. ●
- – Staind’s Aaron Lewis. Not playing his music might be the nicest thing country radio did for me this year.

I had it on hold (to record) for a good, long while. I felt like it was a really good song, but towards the end, it didn’t seem to fit everything else we had on the record, so I passed on it and never heard the song again until Jamey came out with [it] and started having success with it. ●
- – Josh Turner reveals that he had “In Color” on hold for a while. So did Trace Adkins. As the story goes, Jamey Johnson won it back by the pure magisterial force of his beardiness.

Here’s another video from the George Jones birthday celebration at the Opry.

For us, the Grammys have always been one of the biggest events of the year. A lot of families do sports and we do music. So for us, it’s the equivalent of making it to the Super Bowl. ●
- – Kimberly Perry on Wednesday’s Grammy nominations.

The CMAs have always been the Super Bowl in The Band Perry household, so we feel like we’re walking away with Super Bowl rings tonight. ●
- – Kimberly Perry last month, on The Band Perry’s CMA wins. Super Bowl comparisons are her Taylor Swift surprise face.

It’s really perfect because we all have some of the same influences. I’m from east Tennessee, and mine is Dolly, but I love Merle, too. Miranda is Merle and Ang is more Loretta. So we have these different styles, but when we write together, our influences all come together in our songwriting. Hopefully people see that and we do it justice. ●
- – Ashley Monroe on the Pistol Annies style.

Faith Hill talked about the big box of peanuts she and her two older brothers received from their mother and father one Christmas. They had to dig through to find money. “I got so upset because she didn’t put any money in my box. I thought, “She gypped me!’” ●
- – Faith Hill’s cute holiday story comes complete with a racial slur.

I have a huge reverence for country music. Huge. And I think it’s up to us to kind of take that flag and move it somewhere. Now, people don’t have to follow us there. That’s fair. But I think it’s up to us to make music that at least tries to move that flag a little bit. ●
- – Eric Church returns to his old trusty ‘move the flag’ metaphor.

The report announced work on a television pilot that would act as a starring vehicle for Jennette and stated that she plans to segue from country music to pop. ●
- – Surprise! One album in, iCarly’s Jennette McCurdy might already be over country.

But what’s clearly the most important thing to us is the spirit of the thing. You’re not really gonna see us spending hours and hours getting just the right sound for the banjo. We just go up there, get it working, and then we get out there and play a song for the people. We don’t split hairs too much. ●
- – Seth Avett on the musical approach of the Avett Brothers.

I’d be just fine if I never had to hear the Avett Brothers or Mumford and Sons again as long as I live. Just fine. [...] Y’all are welcome to like their music, of course. I just don’t. I’ve tried. Don’t have to, either. ●
- – I’m with Jason Isbell on this one.

He was looking back at his youth and telling a narrative, and that song just killed me. It struck such a chord with me that I saw there was a different way to write. I knew I had to go deeper. So I finally insisted on having the time to sit down and write. ●
- – Kris Kristofferson gave Bob Seger a kick in the pants via “Me and Bobby McGee.”

I’m in good shape. I’m probably in better shape than most singers age 20. I really am! ●
- – Loretta Lynn, somewhat dubiously.

Q: What do you think of the record?
A: I think it’s alright. You have to hear it, because it grows on you. I have two or three favorite songs. [At first] I didn’t have but one; now I have two or three. ●
- – Blind Boys of Alabama’s Jimmy Carter isn’t one to over-hype (or even hype) Take The High Road.

I am overwhelmed by the amount of people that reached out to let me know they were praying for my son’s safe return. As we move forward from this incident, please remember that everyone has the ability to make positive changes in their life. Our new single “Lay It Down” talks about battling your demons… ●
- – Mindy McCready’s ex-husband takes the opportunity to plug his new single. Classy.

Matraca Berg sings “If I Had Wings” (from The Dreaming Fields) live on Music City Roots. Outstanding.

For his first arena tour as a headliner, Eric Church will launch the Blood, Sweat & Beers tour with special guest Brantley Gilbert on Jan. 19 in Fort Smith, Ark. The tour will stop in nearly 50 cities across the U.S. ●
- – Oh gosh. “Blood, Sweat & Beers” starring Eric Church and Brantley Gilbert? I’m sorry, world.

I don’t think today’s country music is country. It is more like rock ‘n’ roll to me. I really enjoy songs that have a good melody and real good lyrics. I believe this is what makes a good song. There have been many songs from my younger days that have stood the test of time. I am not sure the songs of today will experience this kind of longevity. ●
- – Don Williams on modern country music.

In the end, people want the truth. The second you start second-guessing or writing ‘to’ them, you’re screwed. You can’t make ’em authentic. People think through marketing they can deliver what people want, but [people] know. ●
- – Some guy called John Prine claims that people just want to hear artists honestly sing their truths. I’m gonna get a second opinion from Brantley Gilbert before I make up my mind.

Sara Evans is, no joke, the most beautiful woman in the world. She’s the most beautiful woman I have ever seen in my life. And her butt? I’ve never seen a better butt than hers. ●
- – One of Hugh Hefner’s former live-in girlfriends (Kendra Wilkinson) thinks Sara Evans is the most beautiful woman in the world. Take it for what it’s worth.

Hey, assclown that just punched a lady in the face… get the f*ck out of my show! ●
- – Chris Young to guy that evidently punched a woman in the face during “Gettin’ You Home.”

That’s always appealing — to find guys with guts enough to sing like girls. ●
- – Vince Gill on collaborating with Sting.

He loves me. And I love and adore him. Last year when something was on Twitter or somebody took it the wrong way, I was like, ‘OK, people, I’ve known him since I was 17 years old. He’s far beyond being a homophobe. He’ll pinch my ass and pick on me and tell me he loves me. He’ll say, ‘I know you’re gay but, really, the blue nails last night?’ ●
- – Nashville songwriter Shane Stevens, a homosexual, on the alleged homophobia of Blake Shelton.

You have to pick your battles. I’ve certainly had to bite my tongue on occasion and live to fight another day, so to speak, on certain things. But when you’re new and fresh, you come out and think, ‘I don’t want to screw my chance up, so I’ll go along with what everybody else does.’ So in that process of what everybody else says, sometimes you can lose your identity, and then it’s a downward spiral from there. I’ve certainly battled with that in my career. ●
- – Joe Nichols, frankly, on playing the game.

Thanksgiving. Not a good day to be my pants!! ●
- – In fact, there’s no such thing as a good day to be Danny Gokey’s pants.

Mainstream country comes mostly out of Nashville; that’s a real industry-driven town, whereas the Texas music scene is a lot more about live music. It’s about … The people that sing the songs are most likely the ones that wrote them. I don’t know, it’s just a more honest music scene. The songs people are singing are more likely to relate directly to the people singing them, whereas Nashville seems like, if there’s a song that’s about fried chicken that’s a hit, then everybody writes a song about fried chicken. If there’s a sailboat song, then everybody writes a sailboat song. It seems like they’re more of a bandwagon type of scene. ●
- – Reckless Kelly’s Willy Braun contrasts (quite questionably) the Texas and Nashville scenes.

If I want to hear a Hank song, I’ll listen to Hank. If anybody’s gonna do ’em, it probably should’ve been more of the old-timers like (Kris) Kristofferson and David Allan Coe. But if it’s an unfinished song, there might be a reason it was an unfinished song. ●
- – Hank Williams III on the “Lost Notebooks” of his grandfather.

It’s a fantasy about simple life and basic values and there’s not too much psychology or over-thinking things. It’s ‘one woman and only this woman’, you know? It’s ‘I believe this and only this’. It’s ‘I killed this person and I should have’, or ‘I killed that person and I shouldn’t have’. It’s very black and white and I love the picture it paints about home and family. ●
- – Alison Krauss appreciates bluegrass’ pastoral appeal.

Radio has always been generous to me, but in effect they say ‘Do a great record, and we’ll play it. If it’s not great, you’ll stand in line with everyone else.’ I think that’s fair. I don’t expect special treatment. But, if I do a great song, they just might play it. ●
- – You can count Kenny Rogers as one of the few old guys who thinks he’s still getting a fair shake at radio.

I don’t imagine they [the police] went too deep into the bus before they kinda about half passed out. ●
- – Billy Joe Shaver on one of Willie Nelson’s drug busts.

[Johnny Cash] was really singing our song when he said, ‘I’ve been everywhere, man.’ ●
- – Obama’s well of country music knowledge runs at least as deep as a Choice Hotels ad.

The next record is going to be a little different, kind of like a Lyle Lovett record. I have these country songs I love… sort of Willie Nelson country. I was raised on that. ●
- – Matraca Berg is already plotting her next album. And it sounds promising.

I like the idea of stripping everything that we have down to the bare bones and really kind of building it back up to sound contemporary but still have this organic, old school vibe on songs. That’s almost like coming 360, in a way, to where I began with this very traditional kind of country music. I feel like there’s a gap there these days. No one’s really doing it, and I want to kind of bring it back a little bit. ●
- – Not sure what excites me more: that LeAnn Rimes is coming back around to a more traditional country style or that anyone is correctly understanding a 360° turn (i.e. not an about-face).

It was celebrity coverage, which meant your stories were subject to be negotiated. A typical negotiation between editor and publicist would go something like this: “If you let us do the photo shoot in Star X’s house, we won’t say a thing about that nasty little episode that’s been in the press lately, but we will use all the quotes you can give us about his new album.”
A singer’s age, especially a female singer’s age after she’d been on the scene a few years, either was discreetly omitted or was whatever she said it was. It was part of the deal: The celebrity gives access, the celebrity press presents you as you wish to be presented. ●
- – An editor for “Country Weekly” during its ’90s heyday spills the beans.

The most outlaw thing you can do in Nashville right now is play country music. ●
- – Marty Stuart.