C&I Blog

Country music artist Jamey Johnson joined the festivities Tuesday when hunky movie star (and former C&I cover boy) Matthew McConaughey celebrated his 40^th birthday with a well-attended gathering of family and friends. And mind, you the key word is celebrated: Matthew actually thinks life is getting better as he grows older. “The 30’s were good to me,” he noted on his MySpace page, “and I’m really looking forward to my 40’s, ’cause I'm late bloomer. Got everything I need for a perfect 40th…a happy and healthy lady, son, and another baby on the way…”  Just how festive were those festivities? Matthew says “there were some epic stories told, lot of laughs and definitely some roasting.  Somehow! No blood or glass broken, and that's cus the gig was so organized by lady and we went 'til 4:30am.”

In a recent interview with CMT , Carrie Underwood says "I think to every woman, this song would be telling a story about someone they know or met or has tried to pick them up in a bar," but stresses that she's not a hater. "We're not trashing this guy; we're just warning these other girls about him," she says of her sassy single, which you can watch below.

According to the Los Angeles Times, Fox Searchlight has decided more or less at the last minute to make a major awards-season push for Crazy Heart, a small-budget indie drama starring Jeff Bridges as a burnt-out Country music artist who tries to jump-start his stalled career, Colin Farrell as a Country superstar who used to be Bridges’ protégé – and C&I favorite Robert Duvall as Bridges’ former mentor. Originally announced as a 2010 release, Crazy Heart now is scheduled to open Dec. 11 in Los Angeles and New York to qualify for year-end ten-best lists and, of course, Oscar nominations. Of course, if Bridges doesn't win the Best Actor prize for this film, he may get another shot at the gold next year when he takes on the Rooster Cogburn role in Joel and Ethan Coen's True Grit remake.

CNN reports on efforts by the Federation of Black Cowboys to establish a safe refuge in Queens, NY, for young wranglers from the mean streets of Brooklyn.

It may be just a tad too early to start referring to Taylor Swift as Star of the Century, but… Well, she is entering the history books this week, claiming the Billboard record for the longest-charting album so far this millennium. No kidding. Taylor’s self-titled debut CD, released in October 2006, currently is spending its 157th week on Billboard’s Top 200 album chart – more weeks than any other album this decade. (The previously record-holder: Nickelback.) Taylor also holds the Billboard record for most Top 10 debuts in a calendar year. And she is the only solo female act in the history of the Billboard Country Chart to score five – count ‘em, five! – Top 10 singles from a debut album.
Her list of outstanding accomplishments doesn’t end there. With Big Machine Records’ release of the CD/DVD Fearless: Platinum Edition, Taylor locked down five of the Top 10 singles positions on iTunes’ all-genre singles chart, as well as seven of iTunes’ Top 10 Country singles, including the entire Top 6. Fearless, named 2009’s Album of the Year by the Academy of Country Music, originally was released in November 2008. Now quadruple-platinum in the US, Fearless has earned Gold or Platinum status in 16 countries spanning five continents, and spent more weeks in the No. 1 position atop Billboard’s Top 200 all-genre CD sales chart than any other album this decade. What can she do for an encore? Funny you should ask: After demonstrating her comedic flair last June during the Country Music Television Awards telecast, Taylor is ready to go for some seriously big laughs. So she’s hosting Saturday Night Live this weekend – specifically Nov. 7 – as well as serving as the show’s musical guest. This puts her in some pretty prestigious company – only a few other artists (including Sting, Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake) ever have pulled double duty on SNL. And the last time a female country artist was tapped to both host and perform was twenty years ago – when Dolly Parton did the honors.