Deacon Gets His Liver!

Congratulation to Tim McGraw. Getting his own dramatic series on TNT. Robbers ... based on a book from 2000 of the same name. The Robbers producers have some big shows already on CBS and sounds like a first-class deal. Tim has been offered TV shows and always turned them down. Among those he turned down The Last Ship on ABC. Not sure where Robber will be shot, but Texas might be a good bet. Go get the book on Amazon. Tim is set to play a bad guy named Ray Bob ... Well, all right!

What if ABC's Nashville had been cancelled ... Deacon would have been left there waiting on a liver, so thanks, ABC, for bringing back our important to tourism country soapie "Nashville." Dozens get good paychecks from that production, so it is great news it will return for season number four.

The Voice contestant Meghan Linsey was in town for a hometown visit this week. She sang with Big & Rich and visited with Naomi Judd. Her visit will air on NBC Monday, May 11th.

The Summer tour season is rolling out with Garth selling a bunch of tickets for his Houston run this weekend and Shania adding more dates to her Rock This Country tour. Shania hits the road starting May 15th, with 67 stops between mid-May and mid-October. Sounds like an exhausting pace!

Kenny Chesney and friends going strong with some arena dates in between the stadium shows this week. May 12th means Indy for Kenny with Eric Church ... next weekend, Dallas and AT&T Stadium.

Brad Paisley heading into week #1 of his tour ,.. Camden, NJ; Raleigh, NC; and Atlanta's Shaky Boots Festival.

Toby Keith added Chris Janson to his Good Times & Pick-up Lines tour. Chris is having a landmark 2015. Gone from playing the downtown Nashville clubs and sleeping in his car to opening for Toby and CMT paying for his first video. Life is great for Chris Janson right now ... He is fun to watch live ... lots of energy.

The story that blew me away this week is a crazy one. In the late '60s and '70s ,I knew radio stations did some things to the songs -- sped them up, which may still happen. Cut out words like "CHRIST" in "The Ballad of John and Yoko" (that really was done in Montgomery), It sounded awful with that "edit," but radio stations are not afraid to mess with the product.

Now I hear editing songs is more commonplace. Cutting out guitar solos so the audience won't get bored. Really ... audiences aren't bored by the 20-plus minutes of commercials, but are bored by guitar solos.

You have got to Google the Billboard article by writer Tom Roland. The tail is for sure wagging the dog.

Radio bosses ... telling artists what instruments they like in the songs. Radio has always warned about the length of a song. If you are a big star, you have more rein. Baby acts, you better keep the song short.

The point is to get more songs in an hour. Okay ... get that. But having the nerve to edit an artist's song is bold. Trimming 1:47 from a Brothers Osborne song ... 15 seconds from another act ... 16 seconds from another. Under three minutes, they say, is Country Gold.

Hmmm ... okay, "Dang Me" was 1:47 ... Janis Joplin's "Mercedes Benz" was 1:47 and The Box Tops' "The Letter" was 1:55. Less can be better.

Radio big-shots editing songs themselves seems offensive. Telling artists how long a song can be is their right. Telling them how to do their job ... just feels bad.

This is not going to end well. The commercial loads are at times outrageous. I could give plenty of examples, but will be smart and will not. This afraid to talk ... and shorter songs is not a recipe for survival. People need a reason to stay as well as reasons they might leave. Never changing your music on a Country gold station is a good way to run off listeners.