A One-Man Wrecking Machine

He went back to school and got his masters in advertising, and have you ever seen anything like Garth Brooks?

You could take his career and study it for a semester: master of branding, stage showmanship, product promotion, you name it.

Just this week, he added a second stadium show in Nashville, promoted a concert ticket sale day in Birmingham, announced a show at the Cowboy Stadium in Texas and announced the huge, classic, honky-tonk bar coming to the 400 block of Lower Broadway in Nashville. No one has ever had a week like that, and with career that started in 1985. He’s now 60, but acts like he’s 40.

This coming week, April 15th-16th, he will play Nissan Stadium in Nashville. He is Country Music’s GOAT!

Eric Church’s North Carolina Tar Heels forgot to play the second half and lost the big championship game, but it was still probably personally worth it to take all the arrows that came is from San Antonio for blowing off the concert that conflicted with the Final Four game. It was not a good move and, from a marketing point of view, the situation got tons of media reaction. It was the talk of the town for a few days.

The Grammys in Vegas laid an egg. Nine million viewers makes it the second lowest-rated in history. Where do you start trying to breathe life support into that wounded animal? The pop music that was featured doesn’t feel very inclusive. The show needs catalogue acts, folks that can get eyeballs. It was too top of the chart hip. The first hour was really horrible.

People are not into award shows of any kind lately. CBS has to have low expectations for the CMT Music Awards coming April 11th. If “American Idol” is up against the CMT show, “Idol” will win.

Morgan Wallen was showing off his first spring turkey of the season and got the hunters excited. He also gave $25,000 from his foundation to the East Tennessee wildfire effort. Morgan paid for 2,400 worker meals. Firefighters from all over fought those fires. He has tour dates in Arizona and Florida this weekend.

This week Blake Shelton is on his tractor plowing up the dirt to plant flowers, per wife Gwen Stefani, but he has to work a festival this weekend in Arizona. Nothing else on his published work list until May 22nd at Texas Motor Speedway.

“Idol” with Luke Bryan is #1 on Monday nights. NBC’s music show, “American Song Contest,” is further back in the pack. Luke is another one working everywhere, this week helping break ground for an expansion at the Williamson County Medical Center in Franklin, TN, and he went fishing with Dierks Bentley. Big tour plans this summer.

Great to see names like David Frizzell pop up. He’s being inducted into the Texas Country Music Hall of Fame this summer. Darius Rucker is doing the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville for his annual “Darius and Friends” benefit concert on June 6th for St Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

Luke Combs, Thomas Rhett and Wallen are headlining the Tortuga Music Festival in South Florida this weekend. Combs’ new song is called “The Kind of Love We Make.”

The failure of the Grammys is troubling. The audience used to watch the award shows to see a lot of stars in one place, unusual combinations, and a very special occasion. Artists coming to the winner circle to talk about taking a piss, one artist slapping another artist on stage, there’s a lack of civility and class, celebrating movies that the masses have not seen and don’t intend to see, with music on stage that often resembled a nightmare.

Who is this? Who is that? Unknowns rarely bring in a huge audience. All new music on the radio? Same thing.

Especially with a war in Ukraine, the arts should serve as comfort food, not a continuation of a nightmare. Sad state of affairs. Artists take note: you are needed to keep our heads above water! Help!