Here’s Taylor playing a little “Tim McGraw” before surprising everyone with the actual Tim McGraw to sing “Highway Don’t Care”. Watch out for Keith on the guitar halfway through the video. Although there’s clips of the official video that aired, this is Steve Ditch‘s recording which includes the intro.
The Princess in Red has two nominations to the 2013 MTV VMA: Video of the Year and Best Female Video for I Knew You Were Trouble. The 2013 Video Music Awards air August 25 on MTV and VMA.MTV.com, live from the Brooklyn Barclays Center.
August 15: The Red Tour at Valley View Casino Center (formerly San Diego Sports Arena) in San Diego, California. On sale now. More information on Ticketmaster.
August 19 and 20: The Red Tour at Staples Center in Los Angeles, California. On sale now. More information on Ticketmaster.
August 23 and 24: The Red Tour at Staples Center in Los Angeles, California. On sale now. More information on Ticketmaster.
Here at the Swift Agency, still a guy who may or may have not slept for twelve hours straight, we said goodbye to the music city yesterday but still have oodles of pictures and blog ideas to go through. On top of that, we have to get to more news updates so it’s time to send off CMA Fest in style.
In case anybody had doubts about it, CMA Fest did finish off with a bang. However, it was a rushed bang since a storm warning was in effect. For the safety of everyone, both attending, performing and working, everyone’s set was shortened.
(Photo: TheSwiftAgency.com)
Brad Paisley managed to perform a couple of songs on his set, including bringing out his guest Charlie Daniels. I actually was still finding my seat as this was going on so I couldn’t get a good shot of Charlie.
The Band Perry owned the stage. This group has risen from opener into full headlining status long before tonight. They’ve got a lot of crowd pleasing, boot stomping, sing-a-long clapping hits to get the entire crowd on their feet. They could’ve done a lot more with a lot more time but safety was on everyone’s minds that night. They still managed to warm up the crowd and it’s very hard not to declare them the best act of the night so I’m not resisting: they were.
(Photo: TheSwiftAgency.com)
Jake Owen has come a long way, and that’s why what happened last Sunday night seems so unfair. He had to shorten his set down to one song. This wasn’t his fault or Carrie Underwood’s. Everyone did what they had to do. The organizers did give Carrie the chance to play a longer set since she was the closing number and no more changes were expected – but the mood on the stadium was that Jake was owed more than just one song and it’s hard to disagree with that. However, storms don’t have a schedule.
Whether it was the right call or things would have gone different it’s hard to say and easy to speculate, but the goal was achieved.
(Photo: TheSwiftAgency.com)
Carrie Underwood took the stage to close the show. I was glad to hear a couple of tracks from Blown Away, including See You Again which was a great song for that night. I don’t know about her choice to cover Guns N’ Roses’ Paradise City. She did sing Remind Me and brought out Brad Paisley for a duet. She closed her set with her hit Before He Cheats.
It’s all a little bittersweet, and I know I tend to overuse that word lately but there’s not better way to describe the end of CMA Fest. Personally, it was a bit of a roller coaster ride. If you’ve never done it, I hope you are in good shape. There’s a lot of walking, standing in line, not sleeping, skipping meals and just asking your fellow country music fans to slow down because you’re out of breath. Ok, that last one might be just me.
Up next… there’s still a lot of pictures to go through so expect a couple of more Nashville Diaries. The RED Tour is finally coming to Canada! The Princess in Red plays the Rogers Center in Toronto, Ontario on June 14.
Here at the Swift Agency, just a guy who’s low on cash, food and sleep, we’re trying to get one more blog across to y’all before we need to run to LP Field. Thursday, June 8 was another night at LP Field with surprises.
I was late to the party last night and missed Florida Georgia Line’s performance of Cruise. Lucky for me, I had already seen them during Craig Wiseman and Friends for Second Harvest at the Ryman Auditorium and at the CMT Awards, with Nelly being brought on stage for both performances.
(Photo: TheSwiftAgency.com)
Lenny Kravitz took the stage for Fly Away and then performed American Woman bringing out Jason Aldean. Taylor Nation citizens will remember that’s the song that the Princess in Red uses prior to her appearance on stage during the RED Tour. Lenny would go on to stay on stage for a few more performances. Yes, I know… he extended his set quite a bit.
Kelly Clarkson would take the stage later for a multitude of hits, but she also brought out Jason Aldean again for a performance of Don’t You Wanna Stay. Kelly also add an additional surprise to her set by bringing out Trisha Yearwood to join her for a cover of Garth Brooks’ Ain’t Going Down (‘Til the Sun Comes Up).
Here at the Swift Agency, still a guy who’s got a party on his hotel room right now, we’re kinda cramming up on blogging before the end of CMA Fest – but it’s going to be close. June 7 was a big night with superstar country groups Lady Antebellum and Little Big Town taking the stage. Good, because I was feeling a little sad that the Sparkly Dressed was out of town.
Following the current trend of collaborating with artists from another genres, it was also a night of surprises. Hunter Hayes was the first to surprise the crowd when he brought out Jason Mraz for a couple of songs.
(Photo: TheSwiftAgency.com)
Lady Antebellum borrowed from all their albums, but for me Downtown from their album Golden and American Honey from their previous album Need You Know were personal highlights of mine.
I loved Little Big Town’s performance of their single Tornado. They also brought out their hits Boondocks and Pontoon. The real surprise of the night was bringing out Sheryl Crow who’s not a stranger to collaborating with country artists. They performed All I Wanna Do Is Have Some Fun. Sheryl then took the stage by herself to sing her new country flavored single Easy.
I bet you got a dead cell phone in your shotgun seat, Taylor Nation
Here at the Swift Agency, just a guy who’s been down this road before, we’d like to remind you to never text and drive. You can turn on the radio though.
The nightly concerts are LP Field have always showcased the best of the best of what Country Music has to offer right now. There’s a very interesting trend of pop, rock and even hip hop artists to seek out the collaboration of country’s best to the point of showing up at events such as the nightly concerts. So far we’ve seen the likes of Jason Mraz, Sheryl Crow, Lenny Kravitz just to name a few and we might still see more tonight.
(Photo: TheSwiftAgency.com)
The nightly concerts opened Thursday, on June 6, with a very strong lineup that included ACM Entertainer of the Year Luke Bryan, the winner of Best Country album Eric Church and the Enchantress herself, Billboard’s Artist of the Year and winner of seven grammy awards, miss Taylor Swift. I’m going to focus on giving you the best of what I saw and liked rather than writing a play by play.
Luke Bryan opened LP Field. I am not sure why he was not one of the closing numbers, but he surely deserved it. The current ACM Entertainer of the Year knows how to put on a show and win the crowd.
(Photo: TheSwiftAgency.com)
It might come as little surprise to you that Taylor Swift was my favorite on June 6. The Blonde With The Sparkly RED Guitar took the stage with Love Story, her most iconic song of all time.
She carefully selected from her repertoire songs from past and present, bringing out Red, Mean, We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together and… well, what started like a wildcard song – her first ever hit single, Tim McGraw. She barely reached the chorus when she introduced the man himself. Later on, Keith joined in as well.
At this point more than a few of you are going “put the video on already!” so here is Highway Don’t Care:
Thanks to muziccitymuzic for posting! I have my own clip, but unfortunately the sound is not very good. I might post it up later.
Finally, props to the winner of the ACM and CMA Album of the Year, Eric Church. Out came These Boots and Smoke A Little Smoke but he also showcased Chief‘s great tracks I’m Getting Stoned, which he used to open, Keep On, Homeboy and Jack Daniels. There was no Springsteen but that doesn’t mean he didn’t take a great night and made it even greater.
