The Return of the G-Man and the S-Woman...

Jimmy Carter in his homebase Nashville

Snow in Chicago and Denver today. It's not even Halloween! The Titans can't win a game ... Saints in the Super Bowl ... Brett Favre and Mark Martin are huge winners ... interesting times...

This week, Garth Brooks will announce something that we think involves some G Man live shows ... no one is saying it's NOT in Vegas. Thursday, October 15th is press conference day in Nashville and a city to be announced. G-Man is back for 12-16 shows? That's another guess swirling around. Surely for sometime of charity, he has never stopped being active in that arena.

Shania has been very visible again lately..hopefully she will come back to scene in something other than a perfume commercial. A little retro sounds good.

PPMs are driving lots of radio people crazy. Many were crazy already. TV folks are used to the daily/weekly fast rating numbers, but radio isn't. Magical consultants appear now with all the answers they didn't have six months ago. Baloney! Same rules apply. Serve the audience! Play good music ... talk about something other than liner cards ... give people a reason to listen ... become a jukebox and you are going to become such a footnote so fast ... don't prove me right on this one!

This Twitter, Facebook stuff is not the end-all be-all answer, nor is putting your station on Facebook. These are all clues, not destinations. You have to do it all right now ... Better water cooler/Internet talk ! I teach 20-year-olds in college and they are as diverse as the day is long. No one knows much, but everyone was talking Letterman this week.

I am not so sure, as Alan Jackson has said, just go look in your concert parking lots ... check the tags and types of cars. Look at all your women listeners on these social sites. I just don't think a bunch of middle-aged white men in offices have any idea what real folks are doing and want from radio in this century. Lots of cocky programmers with very few groundbreaking ideas. I love radio, but is the future of satellite radio for pay? Doubt it. Is it more cookie-cutter syndication? Doubt it. Is it cheaper talent who have no background in the Country format? Doubt it. Taylor Swift is an event; she is not the gold standard. Is Randy Houser and Justin Moore's style of Country more the standard? Maybe.

I know that radio is an intimate entertainment. Faceless jukebox programming is not the future for the advertisers or the listeners ... complicated times.

2010 is a less than 100 days away and the bookings for the next year are flying off the desks. Taylor Swift extending her tour through June 2010. That should bring her $500,000-a-night gross ticket sales and another $18 million-plus cash flow. Some $25 tickets and some go on sale end of the month.

Brad Paisley -- more shows on his extended American Saturday Night tour ... big money as well ... You wonder, can he win Entertainer of the Year or is it ALL TAYLOR all the time? I would stay with the Taylor prediction right now ... she just won three Nashville Music Awards. HOT is not strong enough.

The big Stagecoach festival in California announced two Keiths as headliners. Where is Carrie and King George in all this concert booking flurry? Tim McGraw making a movie Jan/Feb, but we hear he will do more in 2010.

The country signed up for change almost a year ago. Change sure is what we have! Dentists say a study indicates more people grinding their teeth at night. It's no wonder.

It is great that the Nashville concert business has been a bright spot ... Take Taylor out of the physical sales chart. (Miley shouldn't be in it anyway.) What do you have? CHANGE...

Awards shows ... are people into them or out? CMT ratings were good. CMA producers have to be holding their breath. How will they fill the three hours? Bring it a bunch of rappers and rockers? Dave Matthews with Kenny? Taylor with someone? How many non-nominees get to sing?

Zac Brown gets a performance slot? ... Justin Moore, Randy Houser, Jamey Johnson? BUT will those people keep people in NY/Boston/LA/DC/SF tuned in? Maybe 18 performance slots altogether? Brad, Carrie, Urban, Sugarland, Darius, Reba, George Strait, Taylor two slots early and late? Rascal Flatts, Kenny comes out of the rest to do one, running out of holes ... Miranda gets one ... of course Brooks & Dunn's goodbye song, Martina's in ... Lady Antebellum ... whoops, I'm running out of time! Billy Currington sings "People are Crazy"? Zac Brown. if they do "Chicken Fried and Toes"? ... I'm out of time yikes ... Never an easy decision ... Performances sell music ... just showing up not so much .... It's even worse for the Grammy show.

Grammys ... ready for a Kanye/Beyonce/Taylor direct confrontation in Best Album award. It's probably going to happen!