With the Country Music Awards approaching in November, the debate about whether Beyoncé was snubbed by the award show or not has been ongoing.
Two-time Country Music Award winner Luke Bryan has been on a press run to promote his newly released album, “Mind of a Country Boy,” and is one of the latest celebrities to weigh in on the matter.
Andy Cohen asked Bryan what he thought about Beyoncé not getting any nominations for this year’s Country Music Awards on his show “SiriusXM’s Andy Cohen Live.”
In the Oct. 1 snippet he said, “It’s a tricky question, because obviously Beyoncé made a country album and Beyoncé has a lot of fans out there that have her back, and if she doesn’t get something they want, man, they come at you, as fans should do.” He said, “I don’t know how many albums did she sell. I know she had one song.”
“Listen, I’m all for everybody coming in and making country albums and all that,” he added, “Just because I make one, I don’t get any nominations.” Cohen cut in with his own thoughts saying “A lot of great music is sometimes overlooked.”
Concurring with his statements, Bryan said, “A lot of great music’s overlooked. Sometimes you don’t get nominated. Like I said, I mean, I think the CMA, they have their voting body. And they — they vote what they think should make it. Everybody loved that Beyoncé made a country album. Nobody’s mad about it.”
“But where things get a little tricky and … and you know, if you’re gonna make country albums, come into our world and be country with us a little bit,” Bryan continued.
“Like, Beyoncé can do exactly what she wants to. She’s probably the biggest star in music. But come to an award show and high-five us. And have fun and get in the family too. And I’m not saying she didn’t do that. I don’t know. But country music’s a lot about family…but it ain’t always family too we get pissed at each other too.”
Bryan was correct about one thing — when Beyoncé’s fans feel she has been poorly treated, they have no problem with speaking their mind on it. And that’s exactly what they did when they caught wind of Bryan’s comments.
Under Jasmine Brand’s post, one person said, “Watch yo mouf Luke,” and someone else on X wrote, “Country music was invented by Blacks in Tennessee not Texas.”
A third said, “This is racist some kinda way.. ur world?? black ppl start music itself…”
this is racist some kinda way.. ur world?? black ppl start music itself…
— the coolest bitch fr xx 💖 (@XippXapp) October 3, 2024
Someone else with a different perspective wrote, “Not that he’s right, but he means make more country albums… but yo, I gotta question.. . How much time did Eminem, Jack Harlow and all them other white biys spend in hip hop/rap before they were given awards????”
A fourth wrote, “He’s right just cause you make one country album and your name Beyoncé doesn’t automatically gets you nominated. Now if she drops another on and gets snubbed then we have something to talk about.”
As for suggesting Beyoncé should come to an award show and high-five other country artists, Bryan clearly isn’t aware of the moment surrounding Beyoncé’s performance at the 2016 CMAs. During that year, the former Destiny’s Child member performed a country single called “Daddy Lessons” with The Dixie Chicks, now known as The Chicks.
Her performance was met with boos from the audience and racist comments from people on social media, so much so that TMZ reported the CMAs scrubbed their social media account of the performance.
They revealed some of the comments the “Diva” faced were “That’s right folks. Beyonce performed at the CMAs last night & is on a mission to take country music away from us, hardworking white people,” and “Beyonce overrated racist n***er bitch.”
TMZ shared another comment where someone said, “What place does @Beyonce who vilifies police officers who keep us safe have to do with #CMAawards50?”
Catching wind of the fact that she was not welcomed there, Beyoncé revealed in March of this year that “Cowboy Carter” was created because of that moment.
Previous to Bryan’s statements, country veteran Dolly Parton also infuriated Beyoncé fans recently after she was accused of siding with the CMAs on their decision to not nominate Beyoncé’s album.
“There’s so many wonderful country artists that, I guess probably the country music field, they probably thought, well, we can’t really leave out some of the ones that spend their whole life doing that,” she explained. “But I didn’t even realize that until somebody asked me that question.”
Parton lent her own vocals to the ninth track called “Dolly P” which serves as an intro to the song – which is Beyoncé’s rendition of Parton’s 1973 hit song “Jolene.” Parton was also featured on the 25th track called “Tyrant” and it is described as a song where country meets R&B.
Parton added, “So I don’t think it was a matter of shutting out, like doing that on purpose. I think it was just more of what the country charts and the country artists were doing, that do that all the time, not just a specialty album.”
The 58th Country Music Awards airs on November 20th on ABC.
