Sturgill Simpson Is Mad At The ACM Awards
Nashville insurrectionist Sturgill Simpson has never had much love for the country-music establishment, and his new album A Sailor’s Guide To Earth, which is both very successful and fucking great, is only barely a country album. But Simpson has a ton of reverence for past generations of country trailblazers, and he spent a bit of time with Merle Haggard before the legend died earlier this year, talking to him for Garden And Gun magazine. And now Simpson gone public with his revulsion that country’s ACM Awards are now naming an award after Haggard.
In a lengthy Facebook post, Simpson writes about how Haggard felt disrespected in Nashville and how Nashville should not now be allowed to use Haggard’s name to honor its own:
Im writing this because I want to go on record and say I find it utterly disgusting the way everybody on Music Row is coming up with any reason they can to hitch their wagon to his name while knowing full and damn well what he thought about them. If the ACM wants to actually celebrate the legacy and music of Merle Haggard, they should drop all the formulaic cannon fodder bullshit they’ve been pumping down rural America’s throat for 30 years along with all the high school pageantry, meat parade award show bullshit and start dedicating their programs to more actual Country Music.
Simpson also writes about his time with Haggard and how pissed he was that the two of them weren’t on the cover of Garden And Gun. And he tops it all off with a Watchmen reference. You can read the full piece here.