Month: April 2023

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Go Country 105

Go “Dancin' in the Country” with Tyler Hubbard and Keith Urban

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Tyler Hubbard has dropped the demo for his single “Dancin’ in the Country,” featuring country hitmaker Keith Urban. 

Tyler and Keith co-wrote “Dancin’ in the Country” with Ross Copperman and Jon Nite in October 2021, and the high-energy demo they shared is from the day they penned the song.

“I’ve always admired Keith Urban as a writer, but never had the chance to actually write a song with him. Keith came into the writing session so engaged and ready to go where the ideas took us,” Tyler says. “Ross and Jon are two of the finest writers in town, and by the end of the day we had a song we all felt was special. It's exciting to share a behind the scenes look at how a song comes together.”

Keith adds, “Spending a day with Tyler, Ross and Jon in the studio writing this song was a total blast. Especially creating the track with Ross – I love working fast, ideas flowing really quickly – a bass part, a [banjo] part, a very intentionally ’80s country super compressed electric guitar riff.”

“Dancin’ in the Country” is currently in the top 10 on the country charts. It serves as the second single off Tyler’s debut self-titled record, which arrived in January. 

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

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Go Country 105

ACM Awards Week will include a free two-day music festival

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The Academy of Country Music has announced the event lineup for its ACM Awards Week, which spans three days: Tuesday, May 9, to Thursday, May 11.

The week will kick off with ACM Country Kickoff at The Star, a free two-day music and entertainment festival that is open to the public. Happening on May 9 and May 10, the extravaganza will feature performances from some of country music’s promising newcomers and ACM nominees, a Coors Light-presented beer garden, food trucks and an ACM Awards merchandise booth. 

Other notable activities include the private industry-only ACM Songs & Stories Powered by The Bluebird Cafe + NSAI, Topgolf Tee-Off & Rock On presented by VGT by Aristocrat Gaming and the now-sold-out ACM Lifting Lives LIVE: Morgan Wallen & Friends. 

ACM Awards Week will conclude on Thursday, May 11, with its highly anticipated 58th Academy of Country Music Awards airing live from the Ford Center at The Star in Frisco, Texas.

For more information and to view the full event lineup, visit ACMCountryKickoff.com.

The 58th Academy of Country Music Awards, hosted by Dolly Parton and Garth Brooks, streams live on Amazon Prime Video May 11 at 8 p.m. ET

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

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News Daypop

SpaceX’s Starship rocket explodes midair after inaugural test flight lift-off

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SpaceX’s Starship, the most powerful rocket ever built, took off from a launch pad on the coast of South Texas on Thursday at 9:28 a.m. ET, but exploded midair before stage separation. Thursday’s launch marked the vehicle’s historic first test flight.

The massive Super Heavy rocket booster lifted off and sent a massive boom across the coastal landscape as it soared out over the Gulf of Mexico. About two and a half minutes after takeoff, the Super Heavy rocket booster was scheduled to expend most of its fuel and separate from the Starship spacecraft, leaving the booster to be discarded in the ocean. The Starship was meant to use its own engines, blazing for more than six minutes, to propel itself to nearly orbital speeds.  According to SpaceX, the flight reached its highest point 24.2 miles (39 kilometers) above the ground and the explosion occurred about four minutes after liftoff.

Clearing the launch pad was a major milestone for Starship, and although it ended in an explosion, Thursday’s test met several of the company’s objectives for the vehicle. SpaceX tweeted, “With a test like this, success comes from what we learn, and today’s test will help us improve Starship’s reliability as SpaceX seeks to make life multi-planetary. As if the flight test was not exciting enough, Starship experienced a rapid unscheduled disassembly before stage separation” 

In a post-launch tweet, Elon Musk congratulated the team on “an exciting test launch” and said they “learned a lot for next test launch in a few months.”  In addition, NASA administrator Bill Nelson took to Twitter to share his congratulations on the flight test: “Congrats to @SpaceX on Starship’s first integrated flight test! Every great achievement throughout history has demanded some level of calculated risk, because with great risk comes great reward. Looking forward to all that SpaceX learns, to the next flight test—and beyond.”

SpaceX will need a new launch license from the FAA to make another attempt, but the company does not expect the process to be as laborious as securing the license for Thursday’s launch.

Editorial credit: YMZK-Photo / Shutterstock.com

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Go Country 105

Hardy always knew Lainey Wilson would shine on “wait in the truck”

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With “wait in the truck” headed to the top of the country charts, Hardy is sharing with ABC Audio the moment he invited Lainey Wilson on the song. That moment, as he recalls, happened swiftly and spontaneously.

“It was almost instant. I mean, once we cut the song, I remember I was sitting in the studio with Joey Moi, my producer, and Seth England, my manager, and we threw out names, of course,” Hardy says. “We’re all sitting there and I was like, ‘Should I just send this to Lainey right now?’ And they were like, ‘Yes, please!'”

Hardy’s decision to enlist Lainey wasn’t an arbitrary one. In fact, he knew from the get-go that Lainey was the perfect partner for “wait in the truck” because of her ability to convincingly portray a victim of domestic abuse.

“She is that character. And I mean that as in, like, she is so authentic that she perfectly can portray that person and so, it’s so believable,” explains Hardy. “And I knew the whole time, I was like, ‘If she does this, she’s going to kill it and she’s going to be the person that everybody around the world that hears this song is going to genuinely believe that this happened to her, and then people are going to resonate with that.’ So it was pretty much always Lainey.”

“wait in the truck” is currently in the top two on the country charts. The track is off Hardy’s latest album, the mockingbird & THE CROW. 

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

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News Daypop

House Republicans pass transgender sports ban for schools

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The Republican-controlled House of Representatives passed legislation on Thursday that effectively would ban transgender women and girls from competing in female school athletics.  The Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act, which would bar federal funding for schools that allow transgender girls to play on women’s sports teams, passed the House by a 219-203 vote.

Title IX prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in education programs or activities that receive funding from the federal government, and applies to schools and other educational institutions. According to the legislative text. the bill passed by the House, authored by Rep. Greg Steube, R-Fla., would amend Title IX to prohibit transgender women and girls from playing on sports teams consistent with their gender identity. It seeks to amend federal law to require that “sex shall be recognized based solely on a person’s reproductive biology and genetics at birth,” for the purpose of determining compliance with Title IX in athletics.  The text of the bill says it would a violation “for a recipient of federal financial assistance who operates, sponsors, or facilitates athletic programs or activities to permit a person whose sex is male to participate in an athletic program or activity that is designed for women or girls.”

The bill is unlikely to pass the Democratic-controlled Senate, however, and President Biden said Monday that he would veto the bill was it to reach his desk: “Politicians should not dictate a one-size-fits-all requirement that forces coaches to remove kids from their teams. At a time when transgender youth already face a nationwide mental health crisis, with half of transgender youth in a recent survey saying they have seriously considered suicide, a national law that further stigmatizes these children is completely unnecessary.”

Editorial credit: DCStockPhotography / Shutterstock.com

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Country Daypop

Cody Johnson announces double album, ‘Cody Johnson: Leather’

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Cody Johnson announced his next project will be a 24-track double album, titled Cody Johnson: Leather. The new project marks Johnson’s second consecutive double album following his October 2021 project, Human, a two-disc project with 18 total tracks.

After sharing back in early February that he’s been in the studio working on new music, Cody also recently revealed that the record will include a duet with Carrie Underwood. Johnson shared ahead of the CMT Music Awards last month: “I actually just recorded a duet with her (Underwood) yesterday for my new album coming out. And getting to know her — man, she’s such a pro and everybody that she surrounds herself with are all very professional, as well. So I don’t mean this to sound bad, but it’s kind of hard to compete with that.”

Johnson explains that he plans to “release this one a little differently” than he did Human, but didn’t specify exactly how the roll-out process will be different. But since Human dropped all all once, it is expected Johnson plans to stagger Leather’s release over the course of multiple different dates.  Said Johnson of a timeline for the album: “Maybe by the end of the year, maybe next year .. This round of 24 songs, I have to say, is the best round of songs I’ve ever recorded. And I feel like that’s the way it should be. Each album should outdo the last one. There’s some fun stuff. I think the theme of this new album is fun … It doesn’t matter whether it’s a ballad or whether it’s a tongue-in-cheek, kind of a fun [song], it all has to be fun. It all needs to make you wanna move around and bob your head a little bit.”

Editorial credit: Kathy Hutchins / Shutterstock.com

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Country Daypop

Old Dominion to release new song ‘I Should Have Married You’

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Old Dominion announced their new song, “I Should Have Married You,” will be out on April 21st. The track was written and produced by Old Dominion’s Matthew Ramsey, Trevor Rosen, Whit Sellers, Geoff Sprung and Brad Tursi alongside award-winning songwriter Shane McAnally.

Said Ramsey: “There must be a lot of people out there that either need to hear this or need to say it. If you dance hard enough and sing loud enough, maybe the regret will go away! So crank up ‘I Should Have Married You’ this Friday – and thank you for hounding us about this one since we teased it a few months ago!”  To stream “I Should Have Married You,” head here.

Old Dominion has been on the road with their No Bad Vibes Tour since January, playing in sold out arenas across the U.S.. After a stop for a performance at Stagecoach Festival later this month, the band will pick up the No Bad Vibes tour in Savannah, GA, at the Enmarket Arena on May 5th.

Editorial credit: Kathy Hutchins / Shutterstock.com

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Pop Daypop

Jonas Brothers surprising fans with secret limited engagement shows

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The Jonas Brothers are surprising fans across the country with a set of three upcoming secret shows, sharing on social media: “Heads up Los Angeles, Dallas-Fort Worth and Baltimore… We’re coming to town for three secret shows on April 25th, 26th and 28th!”  

The brothers announced on social media they will perform secret shows in Los Angeles, Dallas-Fort Worth and Baltimore later this month, but didn’t reveal any additional details about what fans could expect, such as the venues and times or what songs concertgoers could expect to hear.  For more information, head to www.jonasbrothers.com.

The secret shows announcement come shortly after the Jonas Brothers shared that they are fulfilling a lifelong dream and performing at Yankee Stadium in August; due to high demand, a second date at Yankee Stadium was recently added.

Editorial credit: DFree / Shutterstock.com

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Pop Daypop

Frank Ocean drops out of headlining Coachella Weekend 2 following backlash

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After a divisive and poorly received performance last Sunday, Frank Ocean will not be headlining the second weekend of the Coachella Festival in Indio, California. Variety reports that Ocean has pulled out of his scheduled Sunday performance; the spot will instead go to Blink-182.

A rep for the singer released a statement, saying: “Frank Ocean will not be performing at weekend 2 of Coachella. After suffering an injury to his leg on festival grounds in the week leading up to weekend 1, Frank Ocean was unable to perform the intended show but was still intent on performing, and in 72 hours, the show was reworked out of necessity. On doctor’s advice, [Ocean] is not able to perform weekend 2 due to two fractures and a sprain in his left leg.”

The statement concluded with a statement from Ocean: “‘It was chaotic. There is some beauty in chaos. It isn’t what I intended to show but I did enjoy being out there and I’ll see you soon.’ — Frank Ocean.”

Ocean was originally schedule to headline the music festival in 2020, before the pandemic shut down the festival. Ocean’s performance last weekend  was the singer’s first in six years. Fans became irate when it came time for Ocean to perform, when not only was it announced that his set would not be included in YouTube’s livestream from the festival — but signs placed around the venue declared that no Frank Ocean merchandise would be available for purchase at the festival. The performance itself didn’t begin for nearly one hour after Ocean was set to start, and was cut abruptly short due to the local curfew enforcement.

Editorial credit: Kathy Hutchins / Shutterstock.com

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Go Country 105

Nashville notes: Opry's 'Salute the Troops' lineup + Mickey Guyton on Disney

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The Grand Ole Opry’s star-studded Salute the Troops returns on May 23. The performance lineup includes The Oak Ridge Boys, John Conlee, Locash, The War and Treaty and Jason Crabb. For more information and to get tickets, visit opry.com.

Lukas Nelson and Lainey Wilson have dropped the music video for their rollicking new song, “More Than Friends.”

Mickey Guyton shared on Twitter that she’s reprising her role as Wanda Warbler on the next episode of Mickey Mouse Funhouse. Catch it Friday, April 21, on Disney Channel and Disney Now.

Circle Network is set to air Reportin’ For Duty: A Tribute to Leslie Jordan on Saturday, April 29, at 9 p.m. CT. The special will feature performances from country artists such as Maren Morris and Lainey Wilson. Fans can tune in on the television network or livestream it via Circle All Access’ Facebook or YouTube.

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