The ACM Awards are coming up on May 16, and as always it is my duty to break down the nominees and predict who will take home the biggest awards of the night. This year’s song lineups are quite stacked, with hits from Morgan Wallen, Luke Combs, Jelly Roll, Lainey Wilson, Zach Bryan, and Cody Johnson all being competitive for wins.
Single of the Year
It’s hard to imagine this won’t be a three way battle between Jelly Roll (“Need A Favor”), Morgan Wallen (“Last Night”) and Luke Combs (“Fast Car”). You might think Wallen has the edge due to his popularity. After all, “Last Night” was the biggest hit single of 2023 in the US, of any genre. However, “Last Night” isn’t all that beloved by country awards voters, as we’ve seen at the CMAs and Grammys. At the former, the song was completely blanked, missing out on Single of the Year and Song of the Year nominations. At the latter, it got a nomination for Best Country Song, but ended up losing to Chris Stapleton’s “White Horse.” While you can attribute the Grammy snub to those voters being obsessed with Stapleton, the CMA snubs (plus the fact that “Last Night” did not make the cut for Song of the Year here at the ACMs either) are pretty telling.
“Need A Favor” could upset, but while Jelly Roll’s story is compelling, the song might lack thee strength it would need to beat Combs, who seems to be the next logical option in mind since his “Fast Car” is the second biggest hit in this category and is a cover of the Tracy Chapman classic. And the song had another resurgence this year thanks to Combs’s Grammy performance with Chapman, so voters will have it top of mind.
Whichever way it goes will be a milestone moment, though. If Combs, Wallen or Jelly Roll wins, it’ll be their first win in this category.
Song of the Year
It’s very likely that “Fast Car” repeats here. In fact, the song might be more likely here than in Single of the Year. Can the ACMs really pass up the opportunity to award Tracy Chapman? It’s 50/50. The CMAs gave Chapman the win, and her profile this year was raised by her aforementioned viral Grammy performance with Combs. But one has to wonder if voters will feel a certain way about awarding a folk singer at a very commercial country event, especially since the song isn’t new and it wasn’t even a country song when Chapman originally wrote and recorded it.
But then again, who else would win? Wallen and Jelly Roll aren’t nominated here. Instead, we have Lainey Wilson’s “Heart Like A Truck,” which was actually already nominated for Single of the Year last year, and which has definitely run its course. There’s also Megan Moroney’s “Tennessee Orange,” which strikes me as not enough of a hit to win here, and Jordan Davis’s “Next Thing You Know,” which was a major hit but wasn’t necessarily inescapable. Cody Johnson’s “The Painter” might actually be the song to challenge Combs and Chapman here, as it is not only very heartfelt and traditional, but also a number-one country radio hit. And Johnson cleaned up in nominations, getting five including an unexpected one for Album of the Year for “Leather.” Still, it’ll probably be “Fast Car.”
Musical Event of the Year
If I didn’t know better, I’d say Zach Bryan and Kacey Musgraves’s “I Remember Everything” would easily be winning this. After all, it is by far the biggest hit here, topping the Billboard Hot 100 last fall and still being in the top 15 as of this April. The song also won the Grammy for Best Country Duo/Group Performance, and both Bryan and Musgraves are two of the biggest country stars of the decade … except, they’re not played on country radio. “I Remember Everything” has been pretty much carried by its streaming performance. The song only peaked at number-26 on country radio, which is frankly abysmal for such a crossover hit.
That leads me to believe Jelly Roll and Lainey Wilson’s “Save Me,” which lost to Bryan and Musgraves at the Grammys, will get its revenge here. The song was number-one on country radio, and even peaked higher than “I Remember Everything” on pop radio. Plus, Bryan underperformed in the ACM nominations, missing key categories like Male Artist of the Year and Album of the Year, while Jelly Roll got nominated almost everywhere he could. Wilson will also raise the song’s stock, since award shows love her and she won big at the ACMs last year. So expect “Save Me” to take the lead here.
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