CMA Fan Fest “Country’s Night To Rock” LIVE Blog

cma-fan-festival-2013Welcome ladies and gentlemen to the LIVE blog for the 2013 broadcast of CMA’s Fan Fest, dubbed over the last few years as “Country’s Night to Rock.” Since our live blogs for mainstream country’s big awards shows have been so successful over the years, and because we had many requests to also create a platform for commiseration as what they call “country” music will dominate ABC’s airwaves for the next 3 hours, it was decided we’ll give it a shot for this event too.

This is not a live event. It is culled from footage taken during the CMA’s Fan Fest in downtown Nashville June 6th through the 9th at LP Field. As the night progresses, we will post our observations in an attempt to give voice to the other side of the country music spectrum. You are invited to join in through the comment section below. All times Central time.

Here we go!

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10:05 PM: Welp, that sucked. The show, most of the performances, the fact that my online stream crapped out twice, throwing me off my game considerably. But thanks anyway for everyone showing up, and to all those that participated in the comments (positively and negatively).

Now let’s cleanse our palettes with some true Nashville rising stars that exude soul and true country artistry.

9:59 PM: So hard to pick the most evil pop country star right now, but it certainly is a male performer, and Luke Bryan makes a real good case for himself.

And yes, you have NO idea how hard it is for me right to not make a certain off-color remark about a portion of Luke Bryan;s anatomy. But I made a promise not to revisit that line of humor….

9:57 PM: Just don’t understand The Band Perry appeal.

9:49 PM: Kip Moore would get his bung hole bleached on stage if he thought it would make him a star. No scruples.

9:48 PM: From SCM’s rant on “Wagon Wheel”:

As if legions of college town string bands full of anthropology majors mercilessly regurgitation “Wagon Wheel” over and over to try and score hummers from undergrads after the show in their Volvos with the back windows tattooed with political stickers wasn’t enough, now Hootie has lent his back to the collective toil of the Western World to do everything humanly possible to run this song into the proverbial ever-loving ground so hard that it taps the mantle of the earth and causes a catastrophic volcanic and tectonic event that wipes out the entire human fucking race.

9:45 PM: Who is Old Crow Medicine Show? Huh, never heard of them.

9:39 PM: Brad Paisley and Carrie Underwood will host the CMA Awards again in November. Are we surprised? They have pretty good chemistry when the writers give them decent material.

9:36 PM: And yes, we sort of found a new online stream, though it’s kind of like trying to find a nipple through 1980’s cable filter fuzz.

9:33 PM: Kid Rock is like the accidental anchovie on my Zac Brown / Blackberry Smoke Hawaiian pizza right now.  The reason his nickname is the “Wet Cigarette of Country Music” is because he can take anything and make it trashy.

9:26 PM: Yes, you absolutely positively can’t have any single music event in the English-speaking world regardless of genre or context without a washed up Sheryl Crow showing up and wheezing into a microphone at some point.

9:24 PM: A lot of people observing that Will Hoge’s Chevy Truck commercial is the most country thing on this presentation.

9:20 PM: If Little Big Town’s “Pontoon” didn’t mention “motorbotin’,” and “motorbotin'” didn’t have an adolescent sexual connotation, the song would have never made it out of ASCAP’s songwriting cubicles.

9:17 PM: Just remember folks as you’re watching Lenny Kravitz, he later flipped off this same crowd when they wouldn’t get into his 12-year-old rock anthem.

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9:15 PM: Carrie Mess on Twitter:

“Hey Miranda, your boobs are on fire.”

“Are those vegan leather boots Carrie [Underwood]is wearing? Is she vegan pocahontas?

9:13 PM: Alright , so as we work to re-connect to the broadcast, well share some observances from other folks on Twitter and from around the web…

9:10 PM: Still trying to find a good online stream of the program folks! Looks like the CMA’s are shutting all the live online feeds down like the creativity in a Music Row recording studio. We’ll keep trying!

8:58 PM: Sorry folks, still trying to re-connect. All of our fail safe online TV watching outlets are not working at the moment. If anyone can procure a good link, please share in the comments section.

8:48 PM: Sorry folks, we are on the West Coast, and the only way to watch live is online, and our stream just got yanked. We’re working on getting re-connected!

8:43 PM: Aaaaaannndd, there goes our live feed. Working to re-connect!

8:42 PM: Got no problem with Zac Brown, though he’s not really my bag. Interesting footnote: Shooter Jennings, an artist that struggles to pack 350-person venues is charging $85 for meet and greet packages at his shows. Zac Brown band who regularly sells out 15,000-20,000 person shows at arenas, has an “eat and greet” where you eat a meal with Zac Brown and the band…. $55.

8:38 PM: Eric Church is not Outlaw, just ask him……but he’ll sell you an Outlaw T-shirt.

8:35 PM: Wait a second, did this asshole in Little Big Town really compare Eric Church with Willie, Waylon, and Cash ?!?! Blasphemy!

8:32 PM: There’s something especially sad a desperate about idolizing Luke Bryan and trying to craft your career around learning from his success, but falling short. That’s where Jake Owen is.

8:28 PM: “Double wide trailer back in the holler on a country road”? Jake Owen lives in an antiseptic penthouse suite and spent $800 on a fung shway expert to align his modernist couch and nouveau coffee table with his Tao.

8:25 PM: Hillary Scott is wondering why her man doesn’t take her downtown anymore? Because she’s got one 8 months in the oven. We don’t need anyone’s water breaking on the subway.

8:23 PM:Um, music?

Actually screw that, I’d rather see this chick school these dudes in ping pong than a Lady Antebellum live performance any day.

8:22 PM: How stereotypical is it that they got an Asian to be the super ping pong shill in this stupid bit?

8:15 PM: The name of this song is “Highway Don’t Care (hot pop star saves struggling has-been star’s dwindling career in label-forced collaboration)”.

8:12 PM: Who knows how much they cleaned this up for the tele, but this is the most on-pitch live performance I’ve seen from Taylor Swift in a while.

8:08 PM: Watching Taylor Swift 2013 is like watching the awkward girl next door nearly breaking her ankle trying to walk around in high heels. Just be yourself.

8:06 PM: Someone ask Taylor Swift what Max Martin, Shellback, and Scott Borchetta did with her soul after they stole it.

8:01 PM: What the hell is this? It ain’t even at the CMA Fan Fest. Jason Aldean is such a tool, and “1994” was a total dud.

8:00 PM: They edited out the part when Jason Aldean got his various wallet chains stuck in the braces of one jubilant 14-year-old fan in the front row.

7:56 PM: I just don’t get these country music groups like Little Big Town and Lady Antebellum. It’s hard to identify with the various players. It all seems so arbitrary and random. One of the reasons we love music is through identifying with individuals. These groups are simply designed to take advantage of award show nominations.

7:51 PM: Working to confirm that Blake Shelton’s drummer was indeed injured before the performance, and was replaced by a Chippendale’s dancer, complete with sleeveless tuxedo and white tie.

7:49 PM: Yes, here’s the reigning Country Music Association Entertainer of the Year….to sing a rap song. Beam me up.

7:47 PM: Leave it to pop star Kelly Clarkson to be the first performer to feature some traditional country instrumentation.

7:46 PM: SECURITY! There’s a banjo on stage!

7:44 PM: Man, that opening riff of Kelly Clarkson was straight up ripped off from Led Zepplin’s “Heartbreaker.”

7:42 PM: This show teases work like disclaimers. “WARNING: Coming up, Jason Aldean, Darius Rucker, and Taylor Swift collaborating with Tim McGraw.”

7:39 PM: Interesting factoid, it took 7 Hobbits using shoehorns to squeeze Luke Bryan into his skinny jeans.

7:37 PM: Interesting factoid, The Perry Brothers’ hair was used by Peter Jackson to model the hair of the Hobbits in his latest movie.

7:35 PM: Kimberly Perry of The Band Perry needs to focus more on delivering an inspiring vocal performance instead of her pop-inspired stage gesticulations. They make her performances annoyingly breathy, though this is admittedly better than her AWFUL ACM performance.

7:32 PM: And “Ho-Hey” by the Lumineers is now officially the most ubiquitous song in the history of music.

7:30 PM: Going back to Carrie Underwood opening with a Guns & Roses song—this is par for the course for primetime country broadcasts. They feel the need to apologize for being country, so they always start off with a off-genre song.

7:25 PM: Of course we couldn’t get the performance of Brad Paisley with Charlie Daniels from Fan Fest. That would be against their “no gray hair” policy.

7:23 PM: The thing is Hunter Hayes is a good musician, who apparently can play anything. But he uses his talents for the forces of pop evil.

7:21 PM: Hunter Hayes on the Ellen Show, courtesy of Farce The Music:

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7:20 PM: Hunter Hayes is the Justin Bieber of country music. Eternally pre-pubescent.

7:18 PM: So apparently I missed Carrie Underwood channeling Axl Rose?

7:16 PM: What??? They allowed Brian Kelley to sing??? That 7 seconds right before the commercial was the first peep I’ve heard from that dude during a performance in 2 years.

7:14 PM: Sorry folks, our online stream crapped out, but we got a good one now! Right in time for….oh, Florida Georgia Line.

7:00 PM: Here we go!

6:58 PM: In the spirit of full disclosure, I am currently located on the West Coast, so I am trying to hop 2 time zones away so that I can pick up the live feed. This may result in some broadcast interruptions as our feed has already gone down numerous times.

6:55 PM: One performance we will probably not be seeing is the one put on by Lenny Kravitz. During CMA Fan Fest, he went 15 minutes over his appointed set time, trying to get the crowd engaged into chanting a 12-year-old rock song. They would have none of it, and eventually Kravitz chided the crowd for not being able to “get with love,” and then ironically, flipped them the double bird as he walked off stage. So much for his upcoming “gone country” career.

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6:52 PM: So according to Saving Country Music intel, the event is going to be hosted by Little Big Town, and will feature performances by Carrie Underwood, Brad Paisley, Kelly Clarkson, Blake Shelton, Taylor Swift, Tim McGraw, Keith Urban, Eric Church, Kid Rock, Lenny Kravitz, Lady Antebellum, Jason Mraz, Kacey Musgraves, Jake Owen, Kellie Pickler and Darius Rucker.

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