One Month Down ... Everyone's in Gear!

January and December are usually very different from the rest of the year in Music City. The weather is normally not-so-hot and many get out of town for a good deal of that time. Still work is done ... Tours are planned and announced for later in the year, new music is recorded ... sometimes, though, it's just a recharge time.

Tim McGraw is down in the Bahamas this week spear fishing, Thomas Rhett was in the studio, Luke Bryan and friends in Mexico. The Oaks in Texas playing and fighting norovirus (as I have this week)..

New music is always coming but the most unusual and amazing is Reba's new album ... a double ... Sing It Now: Songs of Faith & Hope. The time is right and this should be huge for her. How can it go wrong? Starting with "Jesus Loves Me." The song from many of our Sunday School days.

Willie is off this weekend not feeling well. He hopes to be back in a few days. This time of year you have to think about that, to .o.. Getting SICK!.

Traveling a lot and getting sick has forced me to consume a little more broadcasting than usual.

If there was one takeaway ... the commercials out of prime time and major sports are terrible. Are there any good radio commercials? If I see William Devane on TV one more time ... Other than a rare few blue-chip spots , daytime is just a sea of gold and silver commercials and sad things for sick children and mistreated dogs. Just to hear a good radio Coke or beer commercial or singing car or airline commercial would be so great. And length of spot breaks. This has to be killing the business. Who wants to sit in these three-, four-, five-minute breaks? In radio as well as TV ... Viewers/listeners are not going to sit through these long stopsets ... They have too many alternatives ... Better find another way and soon. It works in The Super Bowl, where the commercials are better than the game at times. Not so on regular hometown radio. Creativity is gone ... production is gone ... keep shoveling out these four to five-minute stopsets with run-on spots and we will all be gone.

A new President has kept things a poppin' this week. You wonder how all this will shake down. From Ashley Judd to Drew Carey's son, it has been a jarring week for Hollywood/Nashville partisans. Who will be the first to play in DC? Not counting the recent inaugurals.

Will the upcoming Grammys be able to hold the huge audience with pop music as odd and political as it has become? Country stars are popular in middle America ... only thing hotter the classic acts. The Grammys are about the new things ... A few bright lights around here but on the pop side? The Grammys can usually dig them out.

So far ... 2017 looks like people moving pieces on a chess board. The game will soon get underway.