CMT Blog: Around The Web

"Dim the lights ... I've voted myself off American Idol." That's what her Tweet said last week. And I think what she meant was: "Idol is going to suck now." She wouldn't say that because she's too nice. And being too nice is, in fact, the reason she's leaving the show. On her website, she says, "I also realized this season that while I love discovering, supporting and nurturing young talent, it was hard for me to judge people and sometimes hurt their feelings." So nice + funny = perfect judge. But if it's not right for her, it's not right. Now the American Idol producers will have some very big shows to fill. There have been rumors, of course. Some claimed Aerosmith's Steven Tyler was considering the job -- to which Kelly Clarkson tweeted, "Just heard Steven Tyler might be a new judge on Idol this year. ... I'm thinking of auditioning again just so I can see him every week :)" But I don't want Idol to suffer. So I have a list going of other people in the industry who would fit in well at the judges' table if Tyler doesn't want the job. Feel free to add your own recommendations.

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She was there to sing. OK, sing and maybe show off her brand new wedding ring (a diamond band by Jonathon Arndt). But when I saw Carrie Underwood on the Today show on Friday (July 30), doing "Cowboy Casanova," then "Undo It," I was looking past the ring to the rest of the get-up. Thigh-high stockings (or were they boots?) Blouse, necktie and mini sport coat? And hair extensions? I guess becoming Mrs. Mike Fisher hasn't turned Underwood into a housewife just yet. Between songs, she told host Matt Lauer what married life is like so far. "It's a lot like dating life. It's good. We're both very busy people and understand each other's life," she said. "So we're OK with it." Fisher wasn't there because he's up in Canada teaching kids at a hockey school. And she even took a second to comment on the buzz about what will happen at the judge's table on American Idol. Everybody asks me, 'You know anything?' I know what you know. I have nothing!" she admitted.

She has already admitted that her upcoming album, Speak Now, to be released on Oct. 25, is going to be full of songs that are kind of like open letters to the people in her life. She described the music as "things that I wanted to say in the moment that I didn't. Track by track, each song is a different confession to a different person." And from what I've been hearing about album's very first single, "Mine," Taylor Swift is ready to be that open book. One with a memorable hook, too. "You made a rebel of a careless man's careful daughter/You are the best thing that's ever been mine," she sings. The song is reportedly up-tempo, with a big chorus, and according to one radio station, unmistakably Taylor. It's about avoiding, then finding, love. And knowing Swift, the song with be as refreshingly honest as she is.

Photo credit: Stephen Lovekin/Getty Images

Fans are delighted with Jewel's latest album, Sweet and Wild, and the videos for "Stay Here Forever," "Satisfied" and "No Good in Goodbye." Through her "Posted" page at CMT.com, she took the time to answer their questions submitted via Twitter. Here's what she had to say.

@Biebersmusic: Who's your favorite singer? Tough question! I taught myself to sing by listening to so many great singers. I considered each of them like a beautiful color I wanted to acquire, so I could paint my own stories one day. I learned agility and to listen to the band from Ella Fitzgerald. I learned passion and anger from Nina Simone. I learned a wry irony from Nanci Griffith. I learned bright notes from Joni Mitchell. I learned round, warm tones, almost like a cello, from Sarah Vaughan. I learned a full buttery approach from Patsy Cline. I learned phrasing from many jazz greats, and an earnest, straightforward, truth-telling approach from Loretta Lynn. I tried to take parts of each of these singers and combine them so I could use each thing like a tool when I sing. I vary and change my tone and vibrato depending on what I want to help the lyric and story and emotion of the song get across.

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I know, I know. We should all accept who we are and what we look like and all that. But c'mon. Just for one minute, it's pretty fun to try to look like Carrie Underwood, especially on her wedding day. With this Hollywood Hair Virtual Makeover on InStyle.com, you can try on Underwood's updo -- complete with the tiara -- and perfect the look with all the tools they provide. You can even add makeup once your hair is done. You just upload a picture of yourself with your own hair pulled back in a ponytail, then add Underwood's hair, then you can make it wider, longer, move it around and even change the color. (Although I can't imagine why anyone would want to do that.) It's probably not the most productive way to spend a lunch hour, but it is a cool way to make a little daydream come to life.

Photo credit: People.com

LOL. Good one, Carrie Underwood. As if a few weeks off could ever do any harm to your flawless voice. Hahahaha. She told a crowd at the Grand Ole Opry on Tuesday (July 27) that she was kind of worried about getting back up on stage because her pipes might be a little rusty. If anything, it sounds like her whirlwind wedding on July 10 and subsequent honeymoon in Tahiti only made her sound more lovely. People.com reported that she breezed through her medley of songs and signed autographs afterward. "It's the first time I've sung anything since I became a married lady," she told the crowd. We all know she looks so good in love, and I have a feeling she sounds good in it, too.

Photo credit: Kevin Winter/Getty Images

I feel like I just finished writing about Lee Brice's "Love Like Crazy" and now some big country band is making fun of it? That's just wrong. But I think Lady Antebellum is doing it all in good fun and it's pretty hysterical. As Charles Kelley says, Brice's song is on the radio 100 times every day, so when the band started getting parody-song requests, that one was a natural. And Kelley is a natural singing their version, "Biscuits and Gravy," on their bus in Goshen, Ind. With Dave Haywood on guitar, Kelley belts out how he wanted him some Waffle House after hanging on Lower Broadway, and that he's had bacon, he's had eggs, grits, raisin toast. But that one thing he eats like crazy is ... the biscuits and gravy. Funny, funny stuff.

Thank God for the real women of country music, like Miranda Lambert, Taylor Swift and Carrie Underwood. That's what I'm thinking now after having just read this story in the New York Times about how "Everywhere you look, pop has gone Gaga." It concludes that there's a new feminism in pop music and how freeing the expansion of music liberation has been. But what it's really about is how unrealistic stars like Lady Gaga and Madonna really are. It's about Katy Perry's cupcake boobs in her "California Gurls" video. And how Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera were all about their ostentatious image early in their careers. But to me, the unwritten story here is how real country music is.

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You know that old Dolly Parton song, "Old Flames Can't Hold a Candle to You," from her 1980 album, Dolly, Dolly, Dolly? Well, it was written by Pebe Sebert. Doesn't ring a bell? She is the mother of that self-described white-girl rapper Ke$ha, who sings "Tik Tok." I know all this because I watched Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie in The Simple Life. And on one episode, it was Hilton and Richie's job to find Sebert a man. She described herself as a single mom of three kids who played music, meditated and were free spirits. Her wish list for a man was a hippie who was spiritual but not a dumb ass who lived in his car. I've been thinking about all this because Ke$ha recently made some remarks that she was inspired by country music. "My mom wrote country music and I love Dolly Parton and Johnny Cash. I think at some point there might be some country collaborations or records in the future." With a past that includes characters like Parton and Hilton, I'm sure Ke$ha could write a few country songs about that.

I think if I were to describe my perfect summer music festival, it would include beautiful scenery, camping in an old-growth forest, an eclectic mix of roots music to discover and enough land to roam on should I feel the need to get away from the crowd. And beer gardens. And a Bigfoot band. Apparently such a heavenly happening already exists -- probably minus Bigfoot? -- at Pickathon, just outside of Portland, Ore. Featuring some of my favorites from country, bluegrass, indie rock, old-time and zydeco, 35 bands will take to the Northwestern woods on an 80-acre site that should make for some inspiring morning hikes/hangovers. Hayes Carll, Black Prairie, Woody Pines, Elliott Brood, Langhorne Slim, Red Stick Ramblers and the Punch Brothers are just a few artists that I've already come to love, and you can check them out while discovering new music on the festival's excellent website. Or get your imagination running with photo galleries from previous years. So if you're lucky enough to be in the area next weekend, consider exploring some awesome music at an environmentally minded festival (one of the stages runs on solar power), and mark me off a spot under some tall pines for next year. Here's an idea for a Bigfoot trap just in case.