Still chasing that elusive first Grammy.
Eric Church is undeniably one of the most accomplished artists in modern country music. Ask most artists making music right now and they’ll cite Church as an inspiration, and he’s continuing to sell out arenas 20 years into his career with over 11 million albums sold.
He’s also been nominated for 33 CMA Awards, with two wins for Album of the Year for Chief and Mr. Misunderstood, as well as a win for Entertainer of the Year in 2020 among his 4 trophies. He also has 7 ACM Awards wins to go with his 34 nominations, including wins for Album of the Year in 2013 and the ACM Icon Award in 2025.
Despite all of his accolades though, Church is still chasing his first Grammy Award.
Over the course of his career, Church has been nominated for a Grammy Award a grand total of 11 times, which is impressive for anybody but especially for a country artist. His first nomination came in 2012 when he was nominated for Best Country Album for Chief, and in 2013 he was nominated for both Best Country Song and Best Country Solo Performance for “Springsteen.”
Since then he’s been nominated two more times for Best Country Album for both The Outsiders and Desperate Man, as well as Best Country Song and Best Country Solo Performance for “Give Me Back My Hometown,” Best Country Duo/Group Performance for “Raise ‘Em Up” with Keith Urban, Best Country Song for “Some Of It,” Best Country Solo Performance for “Stick That In Your Country Song,” and most recently he was nominated in the brand new category of Best Contemporary Country Album for Evangeline vs. the Machine earlier this year.
But after 11 nominations, he’s still winless at the Grammys.
Of course there are a lot of major country artists who have never won a Grammy, including Dierks Bentley who leads the way with 15 nominations without a win. Luke Bryan, despite all of his success in country music, has never even been nominated. And two of the biggest stars in country music at the moment, Morgan Wallen and Luke Combs, are both still waiting on their name to be called at the Grammy Awards too.
Church discussed his lack of success at the Grammy Awards recently during an episode of Chasing 10 with Randy Moss, while the two were out fishing on Church’s private lake in Nashville.
As Moss pointed out, he never won a Super Bowl during his Hall of Fame career, going 0-2 in his opportunities to hoist the Lombardi Trophy. And Church can certainly sympathize with the industry’s top prize eluding him:
“I’ve been nominated for Grammys 11 times. I haven’t won yet. Eleven time nominee, which counts. It’s like playoffs, right? No Grammys. Now, a bunch of CMAs, ACM, all those things, but no. Eleven times. You’d think at some point in time it would click.”
Moss then asked whether it was simply the love of music that keeps him motivated to keep going despite the lack of (much deserved) recognition:
“That’s really what it is for me. I don’t look at it that way for me. I mean, I’ve been doing this – I started doing this at 18 years old in North Carolina. I’m 49, so for 31 years now, I’ve played music. So that’s really what it is for me.
You can’t control that stuff, right? So yeah, for me it’s the love of it. And it’s been really good to me. I mean, music’s been good to me.”
Of course as an Eric Church fan it bothers me that he’s too often overlooked for awards and accolades, when many of the people winning awards cite Church as one of their own heroes. But at the end of the day, Church has had more success and has managed to have success long after many of the people who actually won those awards – so I’m sure it’s hard for him to be too upset about it.
Still, if there’s one artist in country music who deserves to have a Grammy Award sitting in his trophy case, it’s Eric Church.
If you haven’t watched his full conversation with Moss, it’s well worth it:
