Country Update BILLBOARD.COM/NEWSLETTERS NOVEMBER 30, 2020 | PAGE 1 OF 17 INSIDE BILLBOARD COUNTRY UPDATE [email protected] HARDY’S Women Carry The Load For No. 1 ‘Beer’ Page 4 Country’s 2020 Christmas Music Grammys’ Alternate Women made history when the Grammy nominations were way the culture evolved. Women, according to a piece in The Take On Country announced Nov. 24, as each of the five finalists for best Daily Mail, took on issues related to the home when roles were Page 9 country album was credited to a solo female or a group with originally assigned, and they still tend to take more ownership female members. of such domestic events as Christmas, while men generally act The ladies are dominating country’s new Christmas albums as if the holiday happens on its own. Thus, women usually stress this year, too. At least four LPs and EPs for the season belong to the most in advance while men typically drink the most when the Parton, Brooks Carrie Underwood, Dolly Parton, Maddie & Tae and Run- big day arrives — not that everyone falls into just one stereotype. Ready Christmas TV away June. New male yuletide music is mostly individual tracks, “I guess I’m the man in my relationship,” says Runaway June’s Programming though Mitchell Tenpenny is offering an EP, Neon Christmas. Jennifer Wayne with a laugh, “because he does all the cooking Page 10 That disparity seems appropriate, and I do all the drinking.” too, since women are the gender The tendency to plan paid that takes charge of the holidays. A off in 2020’s holiday projects 2013 study by online research firm as all four of the female acts Shania Twain: YouGov established that women assembled releases that reflect Jazz Icon? are more likely to send Christmas their artistry. Maddie & Tae, both Page 10 cards, buy presents, cook the big of whom are newlyweds, applied dinner, fill stockings and decorate their melancholy harmonies and the tree. Men are more evenly active counterintuitive arrangements to MADDIE & TAE RUNAWAY JUNE Makin’ Tracks: when it comes to buying the tree or familiar carols on the EP We Need Skip Ewing’s ‘Juggler’ — perhaps out of guilt — cleaning up Christmas and infused a new song, Page 14 after the big meal. “Merry Married Christmas,” with their personal status. Runaway Essentially, women are expected to plan and handle the holi- June brought classic pop vocal stacks to a mostly breezy EP, When I day season, so they tend to think about it earlier in the year than Think About Christmas. Underwood, who has periodically nodded their male counterparts. to her faith during her career, expressed her motherly instincts Country Coda: “Men, you know, when it gets a little bit closer, then they’re by centering much of her My Gift album on the nativity, featuring Eddy Arnold’s ‘World’ thinking about it,” suggests Runaway June’s Naomi Cooke. son Isaiah Fisher on “The Little Drummer Boy.” And the bubbly, Page 17 “They’re more kind of like one thing at a time, where women outgoing Parton threw a party, inviting guests Willie Nelson, can think about Halloween and Christmas and Easter and kind Miley Cyrus, Billy Ray Cyrus and Jimmy Fallon for an album of keep all of those things in the same box.” she humorously titled A Holly Dolly Christmas. The two sexes think about it differently thanks in part to the “I love ‘A Holly Jolly Christmas’ with Burl Ives,” she told FAIRCHILD FORD JUNE: RUNAWAY LLANES. JOSEPH TAE: & MADDIE BILLBOARD COUNTRY UPDATE NOVEMBER 30, 2020 | PAGE 2 OF 17 Billboard in August. “He used to be on all of my Christmas specials all through the years. I think of him as Mr. Christmas. I thought, ‘Why don’t I call it something cute and clever like that or Deck the Halls With Boughs of Dolly?’ ” Maddie & Tae and Runaway June supported Underwood’s Cry Pretty Tour 360 in 2019. They did not discuss holiday music with one another at the time, which made it all the more ironic when they each decided to tackle the topic this year. “We were kind of jokingly calling it a ‘Cry Pretty Christmas,’ ” says Underwood. But the seasonal music was also something of a tension release. Even though women tend to shoulder more of the stress of the holiday, working on these projects in the middle of a pandemic provided a sense of creative structure. “It was nice to be able to go in and sing these joyful, hopeful, peaceful songs in the middle of such an unsure year,” observes Underwood. “Because I am pretty type A, I like to know what’s going to happen next, and this year was just Willie Nelson took questions from SiriusXM subscribers for a Nov. 26 not about that at all. So I would go in and just feel blessed that I was in there, Thanksgiving special on the Willie’s Roadhouse channel. Clockwise and I got to sing these songs.” from upper left: SiriusXM hosts Jeannie Seely and Dallas Wayne, In Maddie & Tae’s case, the studio was decorated with a couple of Christmas Nelson and SiriusXM host (and Willie’s daughter) Paula Nelson. trees and they had hot chocolate, though they could not completely escape coronavirus-related conditions from the outside world. “You couldn’t obviously shake hands or hug, which gets us ’cause we abso- lutely adore all of the musicians and the producers that worked on this project,” says the duo’s Taylor Kerr. “We had masks and we had to distance, but for the most part, it felt as normal as it could.” Happily abnormal was the general lack of concern about playlists and instru- mentation. No one expects “Sleigh Ride” to battle for a top 10 position in July, so many of the artistic guardrails are removed. “The thing that Christmas music allows a lot of is you can kind of widen your scope a little bit and try things that might not normally make sense,” notes Run- away June’s Natalie Stovall. “It absolutely makes sense at Christmas because CMT host Cody Alan (left) chatted with Trisha Yearwood and Garth Christmas is almost like its own genre of music.” Brooks in his Zoom Room on the CMT Radio Facebook page on Nov. 20. While the female acts used their creativity to encapsulate their personalities on their holiday music, a comparison with a few of the male projects shows that those differences between the sexes do play a musical role. Tenpenny’s Neon Christmas takes a male approach in its new material, spending the day in a bar in the title track and turning the yuletide into a steamy bedroom affair in “Snow Angels.” Florida Georgia Line’s “Lit This Year” casts Christmas lights against alcohol in a bit of wordplay, promoting the duo’s Old Camp whiskey in the process. But don’t think those general differences apply to everyone. Dan + Shay’s new titles, “Take Me Home for Christmas” and “Christmas Isn’t Christmas,” find men leaning toward the sentimental. And Kerr is quick to point out that while women are more likely to send cards, she’s certainly not among them. “People are going to put them up on their fridge for what — a week? — and then they’ll drop away,” she reasons. “I’m not wasting that money.” Sony/ATV acquired Lynn Oliver-Cline’s River House Artists catalog, Merry Christmas, no matter how you fit into country’s gender scale. which includes hit songs recorded by Luke Combs and Jake Owen. She is flanked by Sony/ATV chairman/CEO Jon Platt (left) and Sony/ATV Additional reporting by Heran Mamo and Melinda Newman. Nashville CEO Rusty Gaston. BILLBOARD COUNTRY UPDATE NOVEMBER 30, 2020 | PAGE 4 OF 17 ON THE CHARTS JIM ASKER [email protected] HARDY Hoists ‘Beer’ To No. 1; Morgan Wallen Makes Chart History HARDY scores his first No. 1 as a recording artist on Billboard’s Country Air- Songs No. 1 and his second Country Digital Song Sales leader. play chart, dated Dec. 5. “One Beer” (Big Loud) — featuring Lauren Alaina Flying in at No. 8 on Hot Country Songs is “Still Goin Down,” which drew and Devin Dawson — rises from No. 3 to the top with 33.1 million audi- 11.2 million clicks and sold 10,000. It opens at No. 2 on Country Digital Song ence impressions, up 10%, in the week ending Nov. 29, according to Nielsen Sales and No. 5 on Country Streaming Songs. Music/MRC Data. Wallen also sports a third track in the Hot Country Songs top 10 as “More This is the second chart appearance by HARDY (whose full name is Michael Than My Hometown” holds at its No. 2 high (27.6 million in airplay audience; Wilson Hardy), 30, as a recording act, after “Rednecker” reached No. 26 in 12.2 million streams; and 5,000 sold). He is the second act to triple up in that April 2019. region of the chart this year, after Combs on Nov. 7 (“Forever After All,” No. 1; “This No. 1 is definitely the most special to me,” he tells “Better Together,” No. 6; and “Lovin’ On You” No. 9). Only Billboard. “It takes a lot of work for a young artist to take a song Florida Georgia Line (six weeks in 2018), Taylor Swift (one, to the top, between that artist and his radio team. So, from the 2012), Buck Owens (one, 1961), Faron Young (one, 1960) bottom of my heart, I want to say thank you and that I’m very and Johnny Cash (three, 1958) previously scored such a Hot excited for this achievement.