Luke Bryan is spending this week gearing up to co-host the ACM Awards for a second time, and on his calendar is a little planning time with fellow host Blake Shelton and performing on The Ellen DeGeneres Show (on Thursday, April 3rd). Luke is looking forward to not only hosting the show again, but spending time with his old friend. “I’m so excited about getting to spend some time with Blake and start planning up what we’ll do and how we’ll host it and stuff like that,” he says. “It’s gonna be fun. It’s gonna be a fun night.”

Last year was such an emotional ride for the Georgia-born performer, hosting the awards and picking up the night’s top honor, Entertainer of the Year, for the first time. “Winning Entertainer of the Year truly changed my life in a lot of ways and just put me in a whole other place professionally and mentally,” says Luke. “It was just an amazing thing to happen, and really really kind of kicked off the top of last year with an amazing start.”

Luke, who is flying up the country charts with his single “Play It Again,” is also nominated for Male Vocalist and Album of the Year (Crash My Party).

The 49th Annual Academy of Country Music Awards will be broadcast live from the MGM Grand in Las Vegas April 6th at 8pm ET/delayed PT on CBS.

Luke Bryan (ACM 2014) 2 OC: …amazing start. :48
“You know, I can’t believe I’m even hosting the ACMs again, that they would have me back. But I’m so excited about getting to spend some time with Blake and start planning up what we’ll do and how we’ll host it and stuff like that. It’s gonna be fun. It’s gonna be a fun night, and to go into that show hosting it, which is a huge honor, to be the reigning Entertainer of the Year is pretty amazing. Last year, you know winning Entertainer of the Year, truly changed my life in a lot of ways and just put me in a whole other place professionally and mentally. It was just an amazing thing to happen, and really really kind of kicked off the top of last year with an amazing start.”