Will Shania Twain be surprise performer at ACM Awards at T-Mobile Arena?
The biggest unconfirmed rumor in advance of Sunday’s 52nd Academy of Country Music Awards — and likely to remain that way until the CBS broadcast from our T-Mobile Arena — is that former Caesars Palace headliner Shania Twain will be a surprise guest to premiere her debut single from her new album “Triumphant” to be released in late spring.
It’s not only her first studio LP in 14 years but also the first without her ex-husband and producer, Robert “Mutt” Lange, who created tabloid headlines for leaving Shania to run off with her best girlfriend.
It will be the follow-up to her 2002 album “Up!” that was certified diamond (10 million units sold). New album tracks include “Who’s Gonna Be Your Girl,” “We Got Something They Don’t,” “Swinging With My Eyes Closed” and “Hard to Love.”
Here’s her appearance last November on ABC’s “Good Morning America” where she discussed many surprising subjects for the first time:
Before going into the studio with producers Ron Aniello (Bruce Springsteen), Jake Gosling (Ed Sheeran), Jacquire King (Kings of Leon) and Matthew Koma (Zedd), Shania laid down tracks at home using the Garage Band and Pro Tools apps on her computer.
There’s no word from ACM Awards producers or Shania about Sunday in Las Vegas, although she has cryptically tweeted, “Here’s to the weekend — there’s no way but up from here.”
Shania does say, “Expect some change and something different from my new material. Writing is my therapy, and writing this new album helped me come to terms with a lot of things emotionally. The divorce was very painful. The new music needed to be really pure and my own story and my own emotional journey.
“It has been a real tug-of-war trying to come to terms with very extreme emotions and explain it to people in the format of a song. It was a big leap of courage for me. I didn’t know where to begin. I’d write every type of song, every type of lyric, every type of melody.”
Shania has confirmed that she will headline with Dierks Bentley and Kenny Chesney at Stagecoach on April 29 in Indio, California, at the Empire Polo Club site of Coachella, then attend the June 26 opening of her exhibit at The Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville. Her immediate plan is to begin work on another album now that she’s completed this one.
It is definite that returning ACM Awards hosts Luke Bryan and Dierks will appear Wednesday on “CBS This Morning” and “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert” before winding their way to Las Vegas to begin Thursday rehearsals.
Then Friday morning, the two country hunks will “roll the dice” in a ceremony outside T-Mobile Arena to mark “The Week Vegas Goes Country” and the three days of ACM Party for a Cause as country singers fan out all over the city for shows to raise awareness and funds. Here’s a YouTube video of Luke and Dierks talking about their hosting duties:
Keith Urban, Justin Moore and Michael Ray will have a mad dash here from Phoenix where they are all appearing at the NCAA March Madness Music Festival the night before the ACM Awards.
For Michael, he’s like a “Wanted Man” with a round-trip double dash as he appears here at Stoney’s Rockin Country on Thursday before racing down to Phoenix and back again. Fans of The Backstreet Boys celebrating their new Axis at Planet Hollywood residency will be overjoyed to know that they’re performing at the ACMs with Florida Georgia Line.