The Creekers band members Tanner Horton (lead guitar, vocals) and Ashton Bowling (cajon) recently sat down on the Whiskey Riff Raff podcast. The band that considers themselves “not your papaw’s bluegrass” told us about their former jobs before they started to take off (and had record labels knocking on their door), how they found out that Luke Combs is a big fan of theirs, and why they often find themselves dealing with imposter syndrome. Horton and Bowling also detailed a wild story about how their banjo player, Scott Sutton, had a heart attack before their debut show and still played through it, then later discuss how they handled getting stuck in Nashville during the nasty ice storm that hit earlier this year. All that to say… there’s a lot packed into this hour-long sit down with The Creekers. We even touched on their upcoming performance at Rock The Country, which is set to be a celebration of community, tradition, and the spirit that’s carried America through 250 years. Coming to a small town near you in 2026 with Kid Rock, Jason Aldean, Ella Langley, Jelly Roll, and many, many more. Don’t miss the action in Bloomingdale, Georgia, Sioux Falls, South Dakota, Ashland, Kentucky, Hastings, Michigan, Ocala, Florida and Hamburg, New York. For the full schedule and lineup and to buy tickets now you can go to rockthecountry.com, and get ready to celebrate 250 years of freedom. You can hear more from The Creekers by checking out the interview on YouTube or making sure to download the podcast on Apple Podcasts by searching “Whiskey Riff Raff” or by clicking here. We’re also available on Spotify and wherever else you can listen to podcasts. Cheers, y’all. Audio Video The post Whiskey Riff Raff Podcast with The Creekers first appeared on Whiskey Riff.

It’s the price of fame and success, I guess… Carly Pearce has spoken publicly before about her very short marriage to fellow country artist Michael Ray, and she previously told Bunnie XO that she was the one who “slid into” Michael’s DM’s because she thought he was cute and had heard a lot of good things about him from mutual connections. This was very early in her career, around the time her 2017 song “Every Little Thing” went #1 and became her first commercial success, and Carly admitted that Ray’s career was very much on the up and up, and she was finally just starting to get a little bit of traction. Carly has confessed that they were both somewhat blinded by the excitement and attention, though she was very clear that she went into it with pure intentions and was getting married “for the right reasons.” She admitted very honestly that she knew the night they got married she “shouldn’t have,” and Carly and Michael were ultimately only married for about eight months in total, from October 2019 until she filed for divorce in June of 2020 And during a recent conversation with David Begnaud on the The Person Who Believed In Me podcast, Carly explained that she knew on the day she got married that she “made a very big mistake,” as did everyone else around her. Yesterday, it got ton of headlines from many different outlets, and really anytime a country star talks about an ex, especially if it’s another famous person, it’s going to make headlines and become a relatively big story. People will be interested in that until the end of time… it just is what it is because people (like me) are nosey. Carly said: “You know when you just know something’s not how it should be? I think everybody in my life knew I had made a… he made it very clear that I made a very big mistake.” She says that Ray had a bit of a “Jekyll and Hyde” personality, but she didn’t see it until it was too late. But, she says she learned a lot about herself, and she learned how strong she really was because she was willing to “blow her life up” when she realized very quickly it wasn’t what she deserved. She admits that she still wonders why Ray wanted to marry her to begin with because she feels that it wasn’t “for real”: “There’s a bit of Jekyll and Hyde… that I did not see until it was too late. And that’s something I’m grateful for my very short marriage because it taught me a lot about myself. It also gave me the album ’29.’ I think it taught me just how strong I am. I knew very quickly this was not what I deserved, and I blew up my life to get out of it. I didn’t stay because society tells you you should. I was done, and I think the one thing that has always carried with me is, why? Why did he marry me? That’s the one thing that I’ve always wondered, is just, why do it if it wasn’t for real.” Of course, there are two sides to every story, and Ray has really never said much publicly about his side of what went down, and as we all know, life and love can be incredibly complicated and we’ll never know the full details of everything that transpired. But Carly says it was “apparent” that their relationship was not what she wanted for her life: “Yes. And it was very apparent for me that this was just not wanted for my life.” It’s not the first time Carly has spoken publicly about her divorce, and you’ll pretty much always see a story about it if it happens because she was married to someone else in the genre. But Carly wasn’t too pleased about all the headlines yesterday, sharing a post of a screenshot from a People story as an example, calling it “frustrating” that she kept seeing it covered by so many outlets. She added that it was one of her favorite interviews she’s ever done, and she talked about a lot throughout the episode, but she didn’t appreciate how answering this question “for two minutes” is what ended up making the rounds. She ended it by saying it’s these kinds of things that make media hard for her because she “didn’t ask to talk about this”: “I have seen this headline everywhere today on different outlets and it’s super frustrating. I literally did one of my favorite interviews of my career chatting about my story and people who have championed me, and I answered one question for two minutes about this topic and this is what gets passed around? This is the part of media that is so hard because I certainly didn’t ask to talk about this.” To be fair, the podcast page had also posted this specific clip (though it looks like it has since been taken down), because these types of clips are what’s going to get the most attention, and then hopefully convince viewers to check out the entire conversation. It’s how the entire podcast world operates. Every Whiskey Riff Raff podcast gets clipped into 5 or 6 little pieces and shared on social media as a preview to the full conversation. And obviously you don’t want to pull clips out of context or make your guest look bad (which didn’t happen here), but the parts of the conversation that are the most likely to garner attention are the ones that are gonna get clipped… the breaking news, the funny parts, the juiciest drama… it’s the nature of the beast. It would be nice if people only ever cared about the music, believe me, but that’s really never been the case when it comes to famous musicians. Think about the most iconic musicians of all-time, who were doing this way before social media existed… Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, Elvis… people were certainly invested in their personal lives as well. For better or worse (worse in my opinion), people are infinitely interesting in their favorite artists personal life, no matter how incredible their music is, and so it’s just part of the job, and you can bet your bottom dollar that if you talk about something as juicy as this publicly, it’s going to become a headline. I’m not sure if she told them she wasn’t going to talk about it before this specific interview, but it came up either way, and as the artist, you really have two options… decline to to talk about, or talk about it knowing that it’ll be a headline that hopefully leads to fans digging in to the deeper conversation.   Of course, Carly is an incredibly talented artist, we share her music anytime she puts something out, and that includes everything she’s done recently with “You Can Have Him,” “Church Girl” and of course, her duet with Riley Green, “If I Don’t Leave I’m Gonna Stay.” Carly hasn’t officially announced the album yet, but she’s off to a super solid start with all of these singles, and I can’t wait to hear what else she has in the works hopefully sooner rather than later. I don’t blame her for being frustrated, I’m sure it’s annoying to always have your personal life under scrutiny and I don’t envy her for that, but I guess the lesson in 2026 is, be careful what you say on a podcast… anything you say can and will become a headline. The full podcast is available below… like she said, it’s a great listen and a neat peek into her story and how she got where she is today.  The post “I Certainly Didn’t Ask To Talk About This” — Carly Pearce Wasn’t Happy That Interview Clip Talking About Ex-Husband Went Viral first appeared on Whiskey Riff.

The last thing you want as a successful southern rock band… Throughout history, some of the most tragic and untimely deaths in music have come via plane crashes. Of course, you have your highest-profile deaths such as Buddy Holly, along with Ritchie Valens and “The Big Bopper” J. P. Richardson, all passing away in 1959 on a day often referred to as “The Day The Music Died,” as well as Ronnie Van Zant, Steve Gaines and Cassie Gaines of Lynyrd Skynyrd tragically losing their lives in 1977. This doesn’t even mention the likes of legends such as John Denver, Patsy Cline, Jim Croce, Otis Redding, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Glen Miller and more, all of whom died in either airplane or helicopter accidents. Reba McEntire tragically lost a number of band members and her tour manager in 1991, Troy Gentry was killed in a helicopter crash, and most recently, legendary country songwriter Brett James passed away in a plane accident. The Skynyrd crash, in particular, is one that has always remained in the back of the minds of many country and southern rock fans, and something similar and equally as terrifying almost happened to The Red Clay Strays on their way to the 61st annual ACM Awards in Las Vegas over the weekend. In an interview with Yahoo on the ACM’s red carpet, the red-hot Alabama band was asked a fairly innocuous, light-hearted question: “What is the most country thing you did this week?” @yahooentertainment @theredclaystrays ♬ original sound – Yahoo Entertainment Bassist, Andrew Bishop, would simply reply that he drove his F-250 Super Duty to their private jet to fly to the ceremony. The Strays’ guitarist, Zach Rishel, however, would reveal the terrifying complications the jet suffered in the air while they were flying from Mobile, Alabama, to Las Vegas over the weekend. As Rishel described, a part of the jet’s engine cowling, the part of the plane that covers the engine, flew off during takeoff, presumably detaching while the band was in the air. Bluntly, he’d say: “We almost died in that private jet.” After joking that the entire situation was “pretty country” and referencing the aforementioned Skynyrd crash, Bishop would then note that they were forced to circle Mobile for upwards of two hours in order to lose enough fuel to land safely back at the runway. “We had to circle Mobile for about two hours to lose enough fuel to land again, to then get some more planes.” Hall would then pull up a photo of the jet on his phone, which confirmed that the cowling did, in fact, fly off and left the engine completely exposed. Thankfully for Red Clay, they landed safely, switched planes and made a smooth trip to Vegas. As we know, the trip proved to be worth the risk as they won their first-ever ACM Group of the Year Award, finally dethroning Old Dominion as they did at the CMAs last November and subsequently snapping their eight-year winning streak. Additionally, they delivered a stellar performance of their new single, “Demons In Your Choir,” which you can watch below. Grateful Tour Dates July 30 – Columbia, MD – Merriweather Post Pavilion with The Revivalist & Haley Reinhart August 1 – Boston, MA – TD Garden with The Revivalist & Haley Reinhart August 5 – Laval, CA – Place Bell with The Revivalist & Haley Reinhart August 7 – Philadelphia, PA – TD Pavilion at The Mann with The Revivalist & Brent Cobb August 9 – New York, NY – Madison Square Garden with The Revivalist & Brent Cobb August 16 – Sioux Falls, SD – Denny Sanford PREMIER Center with Dylan Gossett & Sweet Talk August 18 – Grand Forks, ND – Alerus Center with Dylan Gossett & Sweet Talk August 19 – Bismarck, ND – Bismarck Event Center with Dylan Gossett & Sweet Talk August 21 – Bozeman, MT – Brick Breeden Fieldhouse with Sweet Talk August 22 – Missoula, MT – Adams Ceter with Dylan Gossett & Sweet Talk August 26 – Spokane, WA – Numerica Veterans Arena with Wyatt Flores & Sweet Talk August 27 – Seattle, WA – Climate Pledge Arena with Wyatt Flores & Sweet Talk August 29 – Portland, OR – Moda Center with Wyatt Flores & Sweet Talk August 30 – Vancouver, BC – Rogers Arena with Wyatt Flores & Sweet Talk September 2 – West Valley City, UT – Maverik Center with Dylan Gossett & Sweet Talk September 4 – Stateline, NV – Lake Tahoe Amphitheater at Caesars Republic with Dylan Gossett & Sweet Talk September 11 – Sacramento, CA – Golden 1 Center with Dylan Gossett & Sweet Talk September 12 – Ontario, CA – Toyota Arena with Dylan Gossett & Sweet Talk September 16 – San Diego, CA – Pechanga Arena San Diego with Dylan Gossett & Sweet Talk September 17 – Phoenix, AZ – Desert Diamond Arena with Dylan Gossett & Sweet Talk September 20 – San Antonio, TX – Frost Bank Center with Muscadine Bloodline & Sweet Talk September 30 – Toronto, CA – RBC Amphitheater – with The Revivalist & Haley Reinhart October 1 – Pittsburgh, PA – PPG Paints Arena with The Revivalist & Haley Reinhart October 3 – Grand Rapids, MI – Van Andel Arena with The Revivalist & Haley Reinhart October 7 – Fort Worth, TX – Dickies Arena with Shane Smith & the Saints & Brent Cobb October 14 – Orlando, FL – Kia Center with The Revivalist & Haley Reinhart October 15 – Savannah, GA – Enmarket Arena with The Revivalist & Haley Reinhart October 17 – Charleston, SC – Credit One Stadium with The Revivalist & Haley Reinhart October 18 – Greenville, SC – Bon Secours Wellness Arena with The Revivalist & Haley Reinhart October 22 – Nashville, TN – Bridgestone Arena with Brent Cobb & Sierra Ferrell  October 23 – Nashville, TN – Bridgestone Arena with Brent Cobb & Sierra Ferrell October 28 – Knoxville, TN – Food City Center with Wyatt Flores & Brent Cobb October 31 – Birmingham, AL – Legacy Arena at the BJCC with Shane Smith & the Saints & Brent Cobb November 5 – Baton Rouge, LA – Raising Cane’s River Center with Muscadine Bloodline & Brent Cobb November 6 – Bossier City, LA – Brookshire Grocery Arena with Muscadine Bloodline & Brent Cobb November 8 – Jonesboro, AR – First National Bank Arena with Muscadine Bloodline & Brent Cobb November 13 – Atlanta, GA – State Farm Arena with Travis Tritt & Brent CobbThe post “Almost Died”: The Red Clay Strays Reveal Scary Jet Complications Travelling To The ACM Awards first appeared on Whiskey Riff.

I don’t even know how people noticed this while Kacey was walking around in short shorts and throwing sausages around on stage, but here we are. On Sunday evening, Kacey Musgraves performed her song “Dry Spell” on the ACM Awards, which served as the lead single to her recently-released album Middle Of Nowhere. It was produced by Musgraves produced alongside longtime collaborators Daniel Tashian and Ian Fitchuk. And as the title suggests, “Dry Spell” is about exactly what you’d think, as Kacey openly admits how long she’s been in a “dry spell,” and how she’s kind of starting to go crazy because of it… She wrote it with longtime collaborators Luke Laird, Shane McAnally, and Josh Osborne, and it’s a hilarious song full of innuendo that has made me giggle every time I’ve listened to it. The girl has had a “real long 335” days, and she desperately resorted to “sitting on the washing machine”: “It’s been a real long three-hundred and thirty-five days And the last time, it wasn’t good anyway I’m so lonely, lonely with a capital ‘H’ If you know what I mean, I’ve been sitting on the washing machine Ain’t nobody’s tool up in my shed Ain’t nobody’s boots under my bed Ain’t nobody’s truck up in my drive For a late night call, for a real good time Ain’t no new notches on my belt And I’m tired of keepin’ my hands to myself 911, it’s officially a cry for help Y’all, I’m going through a dry spell, yep” I mean, some may clutch their pearls, and that’s totally fine, but I have to laugh because the writing is so smart and clever, which is something I can always count on with Kacey and love about her as an artist. And she gave it the full treatment during the show, singing the opening verse while sitting on a washing machine, of course… you also see her throw some (literal) sausage in her grocery buggy, and there’s tons of other innuendo in there too. She was basically up there doing a bit, and I found it to be really funny and unlike anything else we saw during the awards show. But of course, because of the sexual nature of it, not everyone was into it, and that’s okay… a lot of people found it off-putting because of what the song is about, but I saw way more people upset about something totally unrelated to the actual lyrical content. Kacey seemed to have posters which were designed by AI, and there were a few typos there too. They honestly didn’t look that good, and with how controversial this topic has been in the music community, it was a bit surprising to see that, specifically with Kacey because she usually uses her platform to champion artists and music. I’m not sure how much say she had in the putting together of this set, other than the basic look of it all and what she wanted for her props and things of that nature, but it seems pretty obvious to me that those posters were created with AI, not by a real artist: View this post on Instagram People were letting her have it in the comments section of the above clip, and I pretty much agree that it was a misstep by whomever approved this: “Love this, but guys if we’re supporting artists they should also be supporting artists. Absolutely no reason to have terrible AI graphics on the set.” “Did we not have a budget for a proper artist for the background posters? So disappointing to see AI used on this set.” “The posters are references to her previous songs. Either way, they don’t need to be AI generated.” “Gotta love those ‘Freash’ deals. Somebody proofread!” “I love you Kacey but AI for the ‘flyers?’ EEEYYYYUCK.” “Love Kacey but the AI graphics aren’t the vibe.” “Love everything except the corny AI generated flyers.” “KACEY. NOOOOOO. WHY THE AI POSTERS.” “Sounds great love, but if the comments are correct about AI graphics, that’s definitely disappointing. I do think Kacey tends to stay on the correct side of history, so I think it’ll change.” “The AI posters are distracting from the disconnected ‘fridge’ lol.” “Love you Kacey but your mom and sister are artists. Those AI posters are.” “Let’s not use AI please.” “Agree with the comments disappointed in her use of AI. You can hire real artists.” “She uses AI and doesn’t get hate for her but y’all hate on everyone else.” “I love you but the AI posters ain’t it sis.” “It’s not hard to hire someone to design some posters, they would have added a lot more to the set design, these are distracting and ugly.” “This would’ve been cooler had the flyers featured been created by local Texas artists or something, but alas. Here we are with gen AI slop.” Honestly, I was distracted by everything else she had going on in this performance that I didn’t even notice the posters during the actual show, but if I know anything about Kacey, it’s that she’s going to make sure this doesn’t happen again and (hopefully) there won’t be any AI crap on her Middle of Nowhere tour.   Middle of Nowhere Tour Dates: May 3, 2026 Gruene Hall – New Braunfels, TX May 4, 2026 Gruene Hall – New Braunfels, TX May 5, 2026 Gruene Hall – New Braunfels, TX Aug 21, 2026 United Center – Chicago, IL Aug 24, 2026 Scotiabank Arena – Toronto, ON Aug 28, 2026 TD Garden – Boston, MA Aug 31, 2026 Madison Square Garden – New York, NY Sep 1, 2026 Madison Square Garden – New York, NY Sep 4, 2026 Xfinity Mobile Arena – Philadelphia, PA Sep 5, 2026 CFG Bank Arena – Baltimore, MD Sep 8, 2026 PPG Paints Arena – Pittsburgh, PA Sep 9, 2026 Schottenstein Center – Columbus, OH Sep 11, 2026 Fiserv Forum – Milwaukee, WI Sep 12, 2026 Enterprise Center – St. Louis, MO Sep 22, 2026 Target Center – Minneapolis, MN Sep 23, 2026 T-Mobile Center – Kansas City, MO Sep 25, 2026 Bourbon & Beyond – Louisville, KY Sep 27, 2026 Bridgestone Arena – Nashville, TN Sep 28, 2026 Bridgestone Arena – Nashville, TN Sep 30, 2026 State Farm Arena -Atlanta, GA Oct 2, 2026 Spectrum Center – Charlotte, NC Oct 5, 2026 Toyota Center – Houston, TX Oct 7, 2026 Moody Center – Austin, TX Oct 10, 2026 American Airlines Center – Dallas, TX Oct 13, 2026 Ball Arena – Denver, CO Oct 15, 2026 Delta Center – Salt Lake City, UT Oct 17, 2026 Mortgage Matchup Center – Phoenix, AZ Oct 18, 2026 Crypto.com Arena – Los Angeles, CA Oct 19, 2026 Crypto.com Arena – Los Angeles, CA Oct 23, 2026 Oakland Arena – Oakland, CA Oct 26, 2026 Climate Pledge – Arena Seattle, WA Oct 27, 2026 Climate Pledge – Arena Seattle, WAThe post People Are Not Happy With Kacey Musgraves’ Steamy ACM Awards Performance… But Not For The Reasons You Might Think first appeared on Whiskey Riff.

The Big Dog Daddy made it on the Legends Corner mural. There are plenty of sights to see and sounds to hear when you walk down the iconic street of Broadway in Downtown Nashville. The line of honky tonks brings millions of tourists to the city every year. The annual visitor number actually reached 17 million tourists in 2025, proving that people can’t get enough of the pedal taverns, artist-owned bars, hot chicken, and $15 beers. On that note, Broadway looks a lot different nowadays then it used to. But there’s still some remnants of “Old Nashville,” and a couple of tip of the caps to country music history. One of the more famous examples of that is the Legends Corner Mural, which has been a staple of Music City’s downtown area for around a decade. If you go to 428 Broadway in Nashville, you’ll find Legends Corner. It’s been at the corner of Broadway and 5th Avenue since 1996, and at one point, they decided to utilize their exterior wall that’s on the west side of the building and commission a mural. Nashville-based artist Tim Davis painted a scene featuring some of the biggest names of country music enjoying drinks together at the bar. It features the likes of Tim McGraw, Loretta Lynn, Charlie Pride, Blake Shelton, Dierks Bentley, Willie Nelson, Brad Paisley, Johnny Cash, Keith Urban, Merle Haggard, Reba McEntire, Alan Jackson, Luke Bryan, George Strait, Dolly Parton, Miranda Lambert and Garth Brooks, just to name a few (to be clear, that’s sarcasm, since I named all of them). You might remember that Legends Corner caused quite the stir when they replaced Taylor Swift on the mural with Brad Paisley a couple of years ago. As you might imagine, that got the Swifties up in arms… but it’s actually very normal for the artwork on Legends Corner to be updated. In fact, the bar recently added the late, great Toby Keith to the mural. In a very fitting nod to his country music catalogue, they positioned the singer to where he’s raising up a red solo cup, as you can see below: @newkidsofnash Gone too soon but never forgotten Hard to imagine country music without @Toby Keith but so happy to see his legacy honored in this mural. RIP legend #nashville #nashvilletn #tobykeith #legendscorner ♬ Red Solo Cup – Toby Keith There’s no doubt that the Big Dog Daddy deserved to be a part of the mural. I just wish he would have been able to see it himself. It’s already been over two years since the country music world – and the world at large – lost Toby Keith. He passed away back in February of 2024 at the age of 62 after a long and valiant battle with stomach cancer. The loss is still hard to fathom, and though Keith may no longer be with us physically, his spirit is still alive and well. And now, anyone that walks on Broadway will be able to see Toby Keith’s smiling face on the Legends Corner Mural. Hopefully Legends Corner has a supply of red solo cups in their bar, just in case anyone strolls by and is inspired by the artwork. “Red Solo Cup” The post Toby Keith Raises A Red Solo Cup As New Addition To Legends Corner Mural In Nashville first appeared on Whiskey Riff.

Yesterday it was announced that President Trump was cancelling his lawsuit against the IRS after they illegally leaked his tax returns to the New York Times in 2019. In response to that, . . .

Thomas Massie opponent: He has betrayed conservative Republicans | National ReportFollow NewsClips channel at Brighteon.com for more updatesSubscribe to Brighteon newsletter to get the latest news and more featured videos:https://support.brighteon.com/Subscribe.html

REPORT: Iran still does not want to trust America, give up nuclear program | National ReportFollow NewsClips channel at Brighteon.com for more updatesSubscribe to Brighteon newsletter to get the latest news and more featured videos:https://support.brighteon.com/Subscribe.html

Executive Director Curt Mills appeared on the Megyn Kelly Show to discuss the Trump administration’s Cuba policy Contributing Editor Ted Snider joined Dan Profit on Chicago’s Morning Answer to talk about the Iran War Responsible Statecraft quoted Mills on Israel’s involvement in starting the Iran War Mills was quoted on the Spectator’s podcast Americano on modern neoconservatives and the Trump administration Mills was mentioned in the New York Review of Books article “The Neocons’ Revenge?” The post TAC Media Appearances: 5/11–5/18 appeared first on The American Conservative.