Nobody’s had a bigger year in country music than Morgan Wallen.
He had the biggest album of the year with his One Thing At a Time double album, the most-streamed song with “Last Night,” the highest-grossing tour…but on “Country Music’s Biggest Night,” he walked away empty handed.
Morgan was nominated for three awards at this year’s CMA Awards, including Male Vocalist of the Year, Album of the Year, and the night’s top prize, Entertainer of the Year. But when the winners were announced, one by one, Morgan was left watching from his seat.
His fans were quick to take to social media and express their disappointment – and anger – at the biggest artist in country music being snubbed for all three awards. But it was his loss in Entertainer of the Year, which ultimately went to Lainey Wilson, that seemed to get the most attention: While Morgan has been selling out stadiums, Lainey spent part of the year as an opening act for Luke Combs (another nominee that she beat in the category).
But after the awards, Morgan put on a brave face publicly, posting a response on Instagram to being left out of the winners circle:
“Walked in tonight a winner, didn’t leave no different.”
And the following weekend, he took at thinly-veiled shot at the CMA Awards when he had a monster night at the Billboard Music Awards, taking home 11 trophies including Top Male Artist:
“You know, like the song says, you win some you lose some. And last award show I went to, we came home empty handed, and this one, I don’t have enough hands for them all.
So either way, I promise I’m gonna stay the same regardless if I come home with 10 or 0. I’m gonna give y’all my all every single night, every single time I go into the studio.
Thank you, all these awards are really for my fans, so thank you guys so much. Thank you. You took a boy from east Tennessee driving a two-door Toyota Tacoma and turned me into one of Billboard’s top artists, so God bless y’all.”
He also addressed the snub during his recent sold-out two night run at Truist Park in Atlanta while introducing his song “Last Night.”
“Not only is this the biggest country song in America for this entire year. This is the biggest song in any genre that there is…
And as of yesterday morning, I can also say for the first time that because of this song, I am now a Grammy-nominated artist.
They can nominate me for anything they want to, but I don’t ever have as much fun during those things as I do on a Saturday night in Atlanta.”
@amber_catron88 Morgan said fck the CMA’S 👏🏼🙄 he will always be my entertainer of the year. #morganwallen #fyp #cmaawards ♬ original sound – Amber Wainwright
Well despite professing publicly that he didn’t care that he didn’t win any CMA Awards, Morgan admitted during a recent interview with Billboard that it actually did bother him – for a little while.
“Bothered me for like five minutes. And then I’m like, ‘Why am I mad? I’m about to go play for 80,000 people in Atlanta.’”
Yeah, when you’re selling out stadiums (and cashing the checks from the highest-grossing tour in country music) it’s hard to stay upset over something that ultimately has no impact on your career.
