CMA Awards 2013 Predictions:

Entertainer of the Year

Jason Aldean
Luke Bryan
Blake Shelton
George Strait
Taylor Swift

It’s hard to think past all the ticket and album sales from Taylor Swift for the top honor of the night. So she seems to be a guarantee to win this award, especially also since she’s the only female nominated. Luke Bryan is probably the runner-up for exploding onto the scene and with his highly successful album Crash My Party. George Strait is calling it quits and will probably receive some votes, but it won’t be enough to contend with the youth of Country music.

Prediction: Taylor Swift

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Male Vocalist of the Year

Jason Aldean
Luke Bryan
Eric Church
Blake Shelton
Keith Urban

It seems like Keith Urban is always nominated for Male Vocalist of the Year, but never wins. Could this be his year? Probably not because of the competition. If I were to choose, I’d pick Eric Church who is still doing well from his incredible album, Chief. But it looks like this is going to be a Luke Bryan vs. Blake Shelton race. Even though Shelton is still doing well on The Voice, I’m going to go with the hot hand here.

Prediction: Luke Bryan

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Female Vocalist of the Year

Kelly Clarkson
Miranda Lambert
Kacey Musgraves
Taylor Swift
Carrie Underwood

We have an interesting mix of females here. Carrie Underwood has been a power-house of Country music for years, but of late she’s been passing the torch to Miranda Lambert who has an impressive collection of albums herself. Both put on a great live show, but how can you go against Underwood’s strong vocals? By putting her against another American Idol winner maybe? Kelly Clarkson probably won’t win, but she has an incredible voice that can match Underwood’s pure power. While I assume Taylor Swift will win Entertainer of the Year, she won’t win here.

Prediction: Miranda Lambert

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Vocal Group of the Year

The Band Perry
Zac Brown Band
Lady Antebellum
Little Big Town
Eli Young Band

Country music is going through an era of really freaking good bands. Just look at these five nominees. All are incredible and deserve to win this award. While I’ll personally be pulling for Zac Brown Band, I feel this is a race between Lady Antebellum and Little Big Town. While Little Big Town might have more momentum, I’m going to go with the lovable trio.

Prediction: Lady Antebellum

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Vocal Duo of the Year

Big & Rich
Florida Georgia Line
Love and Theft
Sugarland
The Civil Wars
Thompson Square

Did I ever mention how I love The Civil Wars? Okay, now that I got that out of my system, this looks like it’ll be a Florida Georgia Line vs. Thompson Square showdown. Sorry Sugarland, but you guys won this award too many times before. And while Thompson Square is doing everything right, no one’s taken the radio by storm like FGL.

Prediction: Florida Georgia Line

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New Artist Of The Year

Lee Brice
Brett Eldredge
Florida Georgia Line
Kip Moore
Kacey Musgraves

This is my favorite category because it’s exciting to see where the future of Country music is headed towards. Looking at this year’s list of nominees, it’s going in the right direction. Lee Brice and Kip Moore have incredible albums under their belt, but lack the star-power to be considered favorites for New Artist. The way I see it, we have the huge new act of Florida Georgia Line against the talented and edgy newcomer Kacey Musgraves. While I would love to see Musgraves snag this award, I’m going with the favorite here.

Prediction: Florida Georgia Line

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Album of the Year

Blake Shelton, “Based on a True Story”
Carrie Underwood, “Blown Away”
Taylor Swift, “Red”
Kacey Musgraves, “Same Trailer Different Park”
Little Big Town, “Tornado”

All five are such great albums, and it’s interesting to see the females dominating this category this year. That being said, it might be the reason why Shelton’s “Based on a True Story” could sneak away with the award. Personally, I feel “Same Trailer Different Park” is the best album of the group, but Musgraves is up against Goliaths of Underwood’s “Blown Away” and Swift’s “Red.”

Prediction: Taylor Swift, “Red”

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Single of the Year

Florida Georgia Line, “Cruise”
Tim McGraw With Taylor Swift & Keith Urban, “Highway Don’t Care”
Miranda Lambert, “Mama’s Broken Heart”
Kacey Musgraves, “Merry Go ‘Round”
Darius Rucker, “Wagon Wheel”

These songs all got heavy rotation on every Country radio station, but which will come out as the Single of the Year? While “Wagon Wheel” is my personal favorite, I’m just going to keep rolling with the rookies.

Prediction: Florida Georgia Line, “Cruise”

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Song of the Year — award goes to songwriter(s)

“I Drive Your Truck” – Jessi Alexander, Connie Harrington, and Jimmy Yeary
“Mama’s Broken Heart” – Brandy Clark, Shane McAnally, and Kacey Musgraves
“Merry Go ‘Round” – Kacey Musgraves, Josh Osborne, and Shane McAnally
“Pontoon” – Natalie Hemby, Luke Laird, and Barry Dean
“Wagon Wheel” – Bob Dylan and Ketch Secor

This award goes to the songwriters, so it’s actually tougher to predict this one. We have Bob Dylan as one of the nominees for “Wagon Wheel” and also Kacey Musgraves is nominated twice in this category. While I really want her to win, I’m afraid that she won’t.

Prediction: “Pontoon” – Natalie Hemby, Luke Laird, and Barry Dean

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. – “F.Z.Z.T.”

Season One, Episode Six

Grade: B-

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Six episodes into the first season, I expected more from Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a very entertaining hour full of action, quick-dialogue and sometimes intriguing plot-lines. But the formulaic episodes are becoming tired-some and there are just so much more to desire from a secret agency that deals with super powers during the aftermath of The Avengers.

This week’s episode brings the movie back into play as the supernatural occurrences aren’t happening from someone with power, but it’s actually an alien virus from a helmet from the Battle of New York that’s killing a few firemen who were exposed to it. The main conflict is that Simmonds becomes exposed to it and now the clock is ticking before she becomes jolted with enough electricity that’ll leave her corpse floating in the air.

Say what you will about the Fitz and Simmons duo, but so far I’ve enjoyed them. What I don’t like is how S.H.I.E.L.D. is slowly presenting love interests every episode by poking at the possibilities here and there, trying to keep the mass audiences happy. That’s where the focus of the show loses steam. Instead of having episodes concentrate on these supernatural occurrences around the world and how S.H.I.E.L.D. deals with it, they throw in how Skye and Agent Ward would be the show’s most beautiful couple. This week, we see Fitz fumbling over his words talking to Skye, and then Simmons admitting it’s never been an accident that she’s been following Fitz in their past. Can we expect any of these character to get together soon? I wouldn’t be surprised, but I would greatly advise against it.

There is also a story-line between Coulson and Melinda May where they address how Coulson is different after he died in The Avengers. All we really get from that at the end is that he’s a different person from who he was before (oh, and how beautiful the afterlife is). Call it what you want, but I call it playing it safe. And remember when Skye opened up about her past and how she’s searching for her parents? There was nothing about that this episode. All of these loose threads are making for a very scattered series.

I did like the heart-felt climax of Simmons jumping off the plane to save the rest of the crew when Fitz realizes the anti-serum works. But did anyone really believe Simmons was going to die during the episode? Nope, no one thought that. So where does S.H.I.E.L.D. go from here? Are they going to link all of these story-lines somehow? There doesn’t seem to be a season-long arc except for maybe the centipede technology. Unless you consider all of the background story-lines of Coulson and Skye as long arcs, but let’s hope that’s not the case. What we need is something to feel that S.H.I.E.L.D. might not actually save the day at the end of the episode, but will that save it from its ratings drop?

New Girl – “Coach”

Season Three, Episode Seven

Grade: C+

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So remember when Damon Wayans Jr. was on the pilot of New Girl? No? Well he was and as the story apparently goes, he moved out and in came Winston (because you need that one black guy who acts white to make New Girl work). Well Coach comes back and he’s practically a brand new character because we don’t remember anything about him two years ago. We do know that the guys love to party with him and that he just broke up with his girlfriend.

Just an observation: this episode reminded me a lot of the Friends episode when Ross and Chandler’s college buddy, “Gandolf” was supposed to hang out with them and party like they did in the past. Not only was Coach their “Gandolf,” but they share that moment when they realize that they’re not young anymore. In Friends the music at the clubs was too loud. In New Girl, they shouldn’t be drinking on a Tuesday with early work the next morning.

The center of this episode once again involves the relationship between Nick and Jess. Being peer pressured, Nick comments that they never put titles on their relationship as boyfriend and girlfriend. Naturally this offends Jess and while Nick goes out with the guys to a strip club (for old times sake), Jess tries to get back at Nick for making her feel bad. Jess and Cece go to the bar and Cece nudges Jess to call the guy who gave her his number at the coffeehouse. He winds up being a very charming and good-looking guy named Artie (Taye Diggs) and the drunker Jess gets, the more concerned Cece gets.

Meanwhile back at the strip club, the guys are able to extract the fact that Coach misses his girlfriend and also doesn’t want to be at the strip club. But when they make it back to the loft, Artie’s in Jess’ bed in his birthday suit. This is the one moment of the episode I really enjoyed because I didn’t know how Nick was going to react. That’s arguably what is great about the Nick and Jess relationship on New Girl. They’re both so odd and quirky that in the most normal of situations, they act outrageously. Therefore how the hell are they supposed to react in insane situations?

“Coach” was a decent episode, but the return of Damon Wayans Jr. didn’t do anything for me, partially because I didn’t know what to expect from him (plus I’m still used to him on Happy Endings). It was great to see Jess and Cece on-screen, though that didn’t last too long once Artie came into the picture. And even though Nick and Jess wind up feeling good about their relationship at the end, their uncertainty throughout didn’t feel very natural. But that goes along the way every character in New Girl is like a cartoon, acting out and saying ridiculous things one after the other. It makes for some funny moments, but the show is losing its heart.

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Last but not least:

• Winston buys $2,000 worth of bunny money and nothing about this is funny.
• Happy that they mentioned Schmidt moving out across the hall briefly, though I expect that to be some kind of big part of upcoming episodes.
• I laughed the hardest during the scene when the guys run away from the cops at the station.
• That was some sweet Velvet Rabbit swag the guys were rocking.