Gotta respect the legends.
The 2025 ACM Awards are just around the corner, with the 60th anniversary show scheduled for Thursday, May 8 from the Ford Center at The Star in Frisco, Texas. And in honor of the upcoming ceremonies, we’re taking a look back at some of the more memorable moments in the show’s history.
Of course country awards shows have taken a lot of heat lately for seeming to forget their country roots and instead featuring artists from outside of country music to try to bring in new viewers and attract fans of other genres.
It never works, which is really no surprise. Country fans want to see country artists, and pop fans aren’t going to tune in to a country awards show just to see a performance from Pink or Backstreet Boys or whoever the “special guests” are.
And it’s not just the performers: Awards shows often bring in presenters outside of country music, people who probably know nothing about country music. We get appearances from actors and actresses, athletes, influencers…I mean, a couple years ago the awards show featured the cast of Yellowstone instead of the actual artists featured on the soundtrack, which kinda sums up the issue I have with these shows.
Unfortunately, that also makes for some awkward moments…
Back in 2012, actor Ashton Kutcher found himself at the center of some controversy after he came out looking like a caricature of a country artist and absolutely butchered the George Strait classic “I Cross My Heart.”
If you don’t remember the cringeworthy moment, take a look:
And it didn’t sit well with some country artists.
Miranda Lambert took to social media after the show to question whether Kutcher was mocking country music with the bizarre schtick:
And Justin Moore was even more blunt about his displeasure with Kutcher’s seemingly disrespectful display:
Love it.
Ashton later took to Twitter to clarify that he’s a country music fan himself and that he meant no disrespect by his outfit or his appearance:
And honestly, I tend to believe him. I feel like it was just one of those cheesy moments that Ashton and the show’s producers thought sounded better on paper than it really was. The actor is from Iowa, so he’s probably at least somewhat of a country fan, and even if he wasn’t surely he would know better than to mock George Strait at a country music awards show…
For what it’s worth, Miranda apparently caught up with Kutcher a few weeks later at the Kentucky Derby and shared a selfie of the two, admitting that he really does “live country music.”
But at the end of the day, it feels like this is just another controversy (however small it ended up being) that could have been avoided if the show had just stuck to actual country artists and didn’t try to bring in whatever celebrity had a show the network happens to be trying to promote at the time.
I guess I’m just the old man shouting at the clouds at this point though.
Anywhere, here’s how the song is supposed to sound:
