2023 ACM AWARDS:
BOLD CHANGES

For the Academy of Country Music, which has always gone its own way, 2023 marks a massive step forward.

Tapping Mickey Guyton to co-host the 2021 ACM Awards with Keith Urban or making space for Little Big Town to perform the glass-ceiling reality check “The Daughters,” the Academy even took the 2022 telecast to Las Vegas after taking over Texas’ A.T.&T Stadium for its 50th Anniversary Awards. And last year, the ACMs became the first major awards show to livestream via Amazon Prime Video.

Beyond this year’s move back to Texas and a long-term marketing alliance with Jerry Jones’ Dallas Cowboys organization, the ACM is making a tremendous move toward a brave new world. For all the conversation about inclusion around country music—whether people of color or the LGBTQ+ community—the Academy is putting its commitment on full display, marketing not just the embrace of inclusivity but hailing the unlikeliest and most unexpected fans.

As Tennessee passes laws that outlaw drag shows and reproductive rights, while easing concealed gun restrictions a day after the mass shooting at Nashville’s tiny Christian Covenant School, the ACM stands up for an America that has a place for everyone.

“What Country Music Means to Me,” launched across the Academy’s social platforms is a truly “y’all means all” proposition. Shania Twain and reigning Entertainer of the Year Miranda Lambert provide the first voices in the 56-second promo clip. Then the video cycles through Breland and Ingrid Andress—younger artists who represent a Michael Jackson feel-good pop ethos and Carole King’s deeply personal songwriting aesthetic—as well as the Lone Ranger-masked traditionalist Orville Peck (with a curtain of fringe hanging past his jawline) and Black and queer-identified Americana/roots favorite Joy Oladokun.

From there, the very fluid Brittany Broski offers a full-on praise rave, and then baseball great Mookie Betts utters a single word/truth: “Home.” But it’s drag queen Trixie Mattel, swathed in neon yellow chiffon trumpet rosettes, who asserts, “If you like fake hair and rhinestones, country’s the place for you.”

Suddenly, what has been maligned as redneck, racist and homophobic is being loved and affirmed by the most flagrantly pertinent members of the marginalized. With the promo’s second half lauding truth, storytelling and keeping it real, suddenly the music is a level playing field for anyone who wants to delve into the kinds of heartbreak, good times and touchstones that have always defined the genre of Dolly, Reba, Wynonna, Tammy, Loretta, Willie, Waylon, Haggard and Jones.

To hear Twain explain, “Country music was always this huge influence on how I write very statement lyrics” is to understand the power the genre’s best songs contain. Not what Steve Goodman and John Prine spoofed in David Allen Coe’s “You Never Even Called Me by My Name”—trucks, dogs, trains, rain, Moms, prison, being drunk and death—but difficult emotions unpacked for actual understanding.

At the ACMs, always the rowdy organization where everyone was welcome, the stars overlooked by the Grammys and CMA Awards found themselves nominated and often winning. Now the traditional Southern “Y’all Come” is not just an invitation, but a chance to witness a genuine commingling.

To people in the pop world, that may seem like no big deal. But for Rissi Palmer and Cleve Francis, who never got a real shot, even the wondrous Freddy Fender or Johnny Rodriguez, let alone the myriad artists and executives who lived don’t ask/don’t tell lives, not expressing their truth, this moment finally shows one of country music’s major awards shows is willing to put the outliers front and center.

With Kane Brown’s first Entertainer of the Year and Male Artist nominations; The War and Treaty facing off against Country Music Hall of Famers Brooks & Dunn and Brothers Osborne with openly gay–and fabulous–lead singer T.J. Osborne, who came out in TIME magazine in 2021; and three women nominated in Album of the Year, the truth is obviously changing.

Even more heartening, the Academy of Country Music is hastening the process. By helping country music find its heart, they’re sharing a truth that’s big enough for everybody who wants to love the music to feel welcome and appreciated.