Luke Bryan (American Idol 2 finale) OC: …potential of year three. 1:00
“I think as we got into the first year and America really started watching what we were doing and then now, just the talent level this year has been amazing. I mean, our Top 10 was really, really something special to watch. Every person that’s went home in the Top 10 has been a dagger to the heart. I think we’ve really set forth what our show is about now. It’s about uplifting this talent, bringing ‘em, encouraging them, and just making sure that when they walk in the doors of Idol, we’re gonna give ‘em great feedback and we’re gonna look after ‘em and treat ‘em as good as we can. Tat’s the main thing. Me, Lionel and Katy, we have to enjoy our role, we have to enjoy interacting together, and it’s so fun being up there with them in the trenches and stressing with them about who’s going through to the next round and stuff like that. So, I’m loving the show and looking forward to the potential of year three

Brothers Osborne (being nominated) OC: (TJ) …but it really is. :26
JOHN: “One of the things I love about the country music genre is “It sounds cliché to say it’s an honor, but it really is that it’s a family. We’re all really, really close. We’re all a bunch of misfits thrown together. We’re all a little different, but we love one another and respect one another, and I’m just honored for the both of us to be a part of this awesome family.” TJ: “I will say to add on that, it sounds cliché to say it’s an honor to be nominated, but it really is.”

Brothers Osborne (I Don’t Remember Me (Before You) 1:05
“There was a bit of the song that was a little on the nose. I don’t – it started the first tag (sings) which was an idea Shane had. He showed up that day and goes ‘I don’t remember my life before I had my babies.’ He said, ‘I literally can’t think of who I was. I don’t remember who I was before [my] husband Michael.’ And we thought man, that is a really interesting thing. An incredible idea. I’m sure it’s been done to some extent, but I can’t really recall that subject being said that way. And so, we were all about it. We loved the idea and the concept, but when Jay [Joyce] heard it, he goes, ‘Man, I think it would be really cool to save the ‘before you’ till the end of the song and I instantly was like, ‘Man, I think that’s a killer idea.’ John and I were all about it. And so, it ends now (sings) it kind of goes in a turn around. You don’t know what the hell I’m talking about. ‘I don’t remember me,’ you keep hearing this, and then at the end is the reveal ‘I don’t remember me before you,’ which I think is great. It also made it problematic [for] the title of the song.”

Dierks Bentley (Bros O on Burning Man) OC: …great hang. :26
“I’m a huge fan of those guys. They’re friends. We play in a side band together, a ‘90s country cover band called the Hot Country Knights with a K for anyone who wants to look us up. So, we’re just pals, and it’s like this song feels like something that they would sing, you know? It feels like if they’d got this one before I did, they probably would’ve cut it. It was so easy. I just called ‘em up and sent the song and got a huge ‘Yes’ back from both of them right away. They came into the studio like two days later. It was just a great hang.”

Luke Bryan (STH idea) OC: …and Charles. :16
“Darius called me up and asked me to be a part of this song. When I was in college, I’m Going ‘Straight to Hell’ was one of the biggest college anthems that there was, and I was honored to be a part of this with Darius and Jason and Charles.”

Darius Rucker (STH) OC: …great day. :30
“This is an old Drivin’ ‘N Cryin’ song. It came out in ’89 when I was just playing clubs with Hootie [& the Blowfish]. It was a big song to us. It was a big song to everybody around us. It was a big Southern song, and I always thought it was a country song. Drivin’ ‘N Cryin’ is a big rock band, and I always thought it was a country song. I wanted to cut it and Charles told me I should cut it one day, and I just started calling my friends. I called Charles. I called Jason. I called Luke, and I said, ‘Hey man, I’m doing this song.’ They all loved the song, and we got to do a video for it. This is really cool, man. It’s been a great day.”

Kacey Musgraves (Rainbow) 1 OC: …make it through. :48
“The song ‘Rainbow’ was actually written a handful of years ago as sort of a little bit of a memo to myself. I think we can all get stuck in a mindset that things are never gonna improve or you can easily focus on kind of the bad parts of whatever you’re going through and not really realize that if you pulled your head above the water you’d see that the sun is actually shining and that everything’s actually okay. I think one of the reasons that people may relate to the song a lot is because, though it was written to myself, I think that it can take the shape of like whatever someone’s going through – whether it’s coming out and not having the support or just any kind of a situation that they don’t feel like they may make it through.”

Carrie Underwood (Love Wins) 3 OC: …one another. 57
“One of the things that I was very careful about when we were writing the song, I’m like I don’t want to make it sound too easy because it sounds so easy. ‘Let’s just all love each other and get along. Oh okay, I never thought of that. Let’s try that.’ I feel like it maybe there’s a song on the radio or somebody says something, and you have a conversation with somebody that maybe you’re like today I’m going to try seeing things from a different point of view, then you’re one step closer, even if it’s just a little step. We’re just one step closer to each other. So, I love the fact that I feel like this song is kind of saying no matter who you are, what you feel, what you think – we didn’t want it to be political. We didn’t want it to be polarizing. We wanted it just to acknowledge that we’re in a broken world. We’re all human beings. We all deserve love. We all deserve respect and we all should try to show that to one another.”

Maddie & Tae (Friends Don’t) OC: …likes it. [laughs] :22
“So, the story behind our song ‘Friends Don’t’ is actually my sister’s story. My little sister back home in Texas was kind of dating this guy and they’re kind of in the friend’s zone, but they like each other, but they really didn’t know what was going on. And so, Tae and I got inspired by her story and wrote it. She kinda gets frustrated when we write songs about her, but I know she secretly likes it.” [laughs]

Carrie Underwood (having both boys on the road) OC: …keep doing :25
“It’s going to be interesting having both of them on the road. The last time we were out on tour, Isaiah was 11 months old and perfectly content hanging out on the bus and this time, I feel like he’s going to be, I don’t know. He’ll either love it or be a holy terror to everyone [laughs], everyone else. You just figure out life and make up rules as you go along. That’s what we’re gonna keep doing.”

Carrie Underwood (performing live on stage) OC: …a lot of fun. :35
“I think my favorite thing about performing live is just getting kind of lost in the music and the show. I have as much fun as hopefully everybody sitting out in the audience is having. I get to connect with the fans. I get to see people. The people that are streaming music and downloading music and buying albums, they’re finally in front of me. To get to have that moment with them is so much fun. The lights and the costumes and getting to have moments with my band members on stage, I mean it’s all a lot of fun.”

Brandon Lay (Mother’s Day) OC: …comes from her. :2
“She works harder than anybody I’ve ever seen. She can outwork most 20-year-olds in the yard still. She grew up on a farm, and I think a lot of that just bulldog it and get it done attitude, I probably get from her. She’ll go from sunup to sundown, and she doesn’t complain, and that’s just so rare. I feel like the work ethic, as far as grind it out and get it done, that toughness comes from her.”

Caylee Hammack (Mother’s Day) 1 OC: …love fully. :53
“I love that my Mom is a no-nonsense woman. I love that she always speaks her mind and she’s super stubborn, because she handed it down to me and it’s come in handy, to be honest. She’s a great cook. I wish I was half the cook that she is. She’s obsessive about Tupperware and plates, which I used to hate, but now as an adult whenever I break a dish or something, I just call her, and I know that I have one on standby. I love that she loves random things so that I can squirrel them away and take them to Nashville sometimes. And I love that she loves big. She either gives all of her heart or nothing at all; she always gives all of her heart. She loves, you know, she has a bleeding heart, and I think that’s just one of the most beautiful traits in the world is to love fully.”

Carrie Underwood (having 2 boys) OC: …little brother. :49
“It’s kind of crazy to think, sometimes I’ll literally look at my husband and be like, ‘We have two sons. We have two kids. We’ve been married for almost nine years. We have two children. We live on a farm.’ Like it’s just weird to think how life turns out sometimes. Life is very different with two. We kind of got out of that baby stage with Isaiah. He’s much more self-efficient, and he can brush his own teeth and put his own clothes on, and he’s making decisions for himself, and then we start all over with the little squishy one again. It’s just kind of crazy. You forget how hard it is, to be honest, but you just figure your way through it. I am so blessed to have Isaiah who is super helpful and super sweet, and he loves his little brother.”

Carrie Underwood (Mother’s Day traditions) OC: …even more so. :40
“We don’t really have like any Mother’s Day traditions. I feel like I remember me and Dad making breakfast for Mom like once as a kid. I’m pretty sure we just made a giant mess in the kitchen and we never did that again, so. Being on the other side of things, I obviously don’t expect anything from my three-year-old, but my husband’s really good at getting presents from quote unquote Isaiah. It’s really sweet, because he likes to bring me things. He’s such a sweet little guy, and anytime he’s outside, he’ll pick me flowers and things. So, I’m like, ‘You’re learning. You’ve already got me wrapped around your finger, and then you do stuff like that, and it’s even more so.’”

Clare Dunn (Mother’s Day) OC: …in the world. :41
“She is unrelenting in her love and her support, and even when we’re crazy kids and we screw up, it doesn’t matter. Her love knows no bounds. And her undying devotion to her kids – to my sister and I – always believing in us a million percent, always backing us up a million percent and helping us navigate life and navigate our dreams and helping us go towards that goal – those are some of the qualities that I hope to have some day as a mother, you know? And I’m so grateful I have THE best mom in the WORLD!”

Darius Rucker (Mother’s Day) OC: …killed me. :17

“I think that’s the main reason I am how I am…an innate fear of disappointing my mom.  My mom’s not even alive, and I have a fear of her looking down from heaven and going, ‘Man I’m just disappointed in my son.’ She could have said anything in the world to me, but if she would have said, ‘Son, you just disappointed me,’ That would have killed me. It would have killed me.”

Darius Rucker (favorite memory of his mother) OC: …my Mom’s song. :34
“Oh goodness! A lot of great memories of her, but probably one of my favorite memories, I was a young kid, probably eight or nine, and she was in the kitchen cooking and listening to the gospel station and Shirley Caesar’s ‘No Charge’ came on and she was singing ‘No Charge.’ I just remember I ran into our living room which was adjoined to our kitchen and I just sat there and I just listened to her sing that song, and I remember thinking, ‘Wow! What an amazing voice.’ That’s just always a memory I’ve always had, and that song still to this day when I hear it just moves me because that was my mom’s song.”

Eric Church (Mother’s Day) OC: …as a man. :57
“My mom, even though my dad won’t like this, my mom is by far the toughest person that I’ve met. She’s tough. One of those people that’s been through a lot in her life, adversity wise and never complains, always really resilient with anything that’s happened to her. And it’s just that attitude, the positive attitude, regardless of what has happened that I think is the one thing that I got from her. With career, she’s always been a person that’s been really positive through times that I couldn’t find a positive streak, [laughs] and she was always really positive, and very much believes in tough it out, keep working hard, and that’s her motto with stuff like that. I’ve always been impressed with that stuff. Then musically, she’s where I get my talent from, musically. She sings great, always has, her mom sang great. I owe my musical chops to her. And she still sings some. So, career-wise, I owe her everything. And just in life-wise she’s given me a lot of the qualities that it has taken for me to get me where I am. Not only as a musician, but as a man.”

Jon Pardi (Mother’s Day) OC: …worrying about me. :29
“My mom’s always been there for me. First of all, she’s a great mom. She’s an angel. She takes care of people that aren’t even in the family. She’s always been like that, and she’s a great mother. She’s always proud, and she’s always there supporting and being a great mom. She’s just a good human being. There’s not one mean bone in her body. And she cries about every time I talk to her. She always worries about me. I have to tell her, ‘Stop worrying about me.’”

Jordan Davis (Mother’s Day) OC: …Mother’s Day. :30 [laughs]
“I’m a Mama’s Boy. I love my Mom, and it’s the way she finds the good in everything. With my Mom, as opposed to finding anything negative, she’s gonna find something positive first. That’s something I really hope I can be more like her on; one of the many things I wish I could be more like my mom on. My mom, she loves flowers, so we’ll get her flowers or take her to, we’re slowly getting her into sushi, so we love to take Mom out to sushi spots on Mother’s Day.” [laughs]

Kacey Musgraves (creative women) OC: …taking pictures. :16
“My mom’s an artist – all different kinds of mediums, paint, but she’s always working on something different. My Meemaw, she’s a soap maker. She makes soap and they’re beautiful and they smell really good and they’re all natural. My sister has an etsy store, and she’s constantly creating something, sewing pillows and taking pictures.”

Keith Urban (Nicole is extraordinary mother) OC: …to see. :45
“She’s an extraordinary mum, she really, really is. Those girls are very, very lucky, and I feel very lucky that the children I should have in this world happen to be with Nic. I don’t know anything about raising kids and Nic does, and that comes in extremely, um, it’s really made for an experience I wouldn’t have had without that. Her patience, her recognizing them as people and not just little kids is really extraordinary. Her attention to honoring their feelings and listening to them right from day one – really being attentive to that is not how I was raised at all, so it’s really beautiful to see.”

Lauren Alaina (Mom keeps her grounded) OC: …same for her. :19
“I honestly would not be able to do it without my mom. I get overwhelmed sometimes, and if she wasn’t there to comfort me or tell me, ‘Look just realize what you’ve got going for you,’ I’d be up the creek [without a paddle]. She’s got my back. My mom would walk through a fire pit for me, and I’d do the same for her.”

LBT (Mother’s Day) OC: …for my mother. :34
“Being a mother is a life-long dream for me. When I was a kid, that’s what I wanted to be is a mama. It took a long time. I wasn’t ever sure that I would be, but I am now, and it’s the greatest gift of my life. And as I’m a mother now, I see what my mother gave up and her sacrifices and her love and how she made us the most important thing in her life, and that’s what I strive to do for my little girl. It’s the most important job I have, and it’s the most responsibility that I have, and I try to live up to a great example that I had for my mother.”

LBT (Mother’s Day-Karen) OC: …every day. :23
“There isn’t anything that means more to me than sitting on the bench and eating a grilled cheese sandwich with this little guy who calls me Mama. There isn’t anything better than that. He’s just a little miracle. I went from dreaming about him to eating grilled cheese sandwiches and ketchup with him, and I could never have dreamed this up – how good it could be, and it just gets better every day.”

Maddie & Tae (Mother’s Day-Tae) OC: …was so fun. :25
TAE: “To this day one of the best surprises I’ve ever pulled off was on Mother’s Day three years ago. ‘Cause my mom’s birthday always tends to fall on Mother’s Day Weekend – it’s coming up – and my mom and dad were coming into Nashville and I was like, ‘Okay-this has got to be a big weekend. It’s Mother’s Day, her birthday and the weather was going to be beautiful, so I planned this awesome surprise where we would drive first – she wouldn’t know where we were going, and then we ended up going canoeing down the Harpeth River [located south of Nashville], and it was so fun.”

Maddie & Tae (Mother’s Day-Maddie) OC: (Maddie) …everything’s okay. :53
MADDIE: “She is so good at balancing is what I’m trying to say. My Mom is such a great balancer, but as I’m coming into our adulthood, and all that kind of stuff, she’s very conscious about when I’m trying to be perfect and have everything in order with everything. And she’s like, you can’t. You can’t do that. Life, you have to figure out how you’re going to deal with the curveballs that are thrown out you. Are you going to catch them and whine out about it or are you going to catch them and move on? Like you have to just go with what’s thrown at you. And my Dad’s been a really, really good supporter on just not letting life’s trials bring you down and letting them just be learning tools and all of that. But, most of the time, a Mama hug can really fix anything.” TAE: “Ahh…it’s the best.” MADDIE: “If my Mom hugs me while I’m crying, everything’s okay. There’s just something about it. I’m 23, grown, but, my Mom, if she hugs me, everything’s okay.”

Shania Twain (joy to be a parent) OC: …means everything. :14
“It’s such a joy to be a parent. So, I relate to all the mums out there who are getting all their love and appreciation from their kids, and I hope, when you’re a kid, a child of somebody, show your mum you love her, because it means everything.”

Carrie Underwood (tour in the round) OC: …with people. :44
“I absolutely love my stage being in the middle of the arena. There is something about it that I feel so much more connected with every single person in that building. I feel like we’ve always done a great job of like having big amazing stage sets and putting on a show, but there’s something completely different – and I remember with the “Storyteller” tour, I was like, ‘Ooh, I hope this is going to be okay. I’m changing everything up,’ But there was just some connection happening. I could see everybody in the arena, every single face. I could have individual connections with people.”

“Hey everybody, I’m Adam Hambrick, wishing all the mother’s a very Happy Mother’s Day. Love you, Mom.”

“Hey everybody, this is Brandon Lay, wishing all the mothers out there a very Happy Mother’s Day. Thanks, Mom.”

“Hey! What’s up guys! We’re Brothers Osborne, wishing all you mothers out there a very, very Happy Mother’s Day.”

“Hey y’all, this is Caylee Hammack, sending this out to my mom and all the other mothers out there – I hope all of you have a wonderful Mother’s Day.”

“Hi! It’s Chrissy Metz, wishing you a very Happy Mother’s Day.”

“Hey! What’s up? This is Clare Dunn, hoping you have a Happy Mother’s Day.”

“Hey y’all, what’s up? This is Darius Rucker, hoping you have a Happy Mother’s Day.

“Hey, y’all! This is Dierks Bentley, wishing all you mothers out there a Happy Mother’s Day.”

“Hey everybody! This is Eric Church, wishing you a Happy Mother’s Day. Happy Mother’s Day, mom!”

“Hi! This is George Strait, wishing you a Happy Mother’s Day.”

“Hey y’all, it’s Jon Pardi. I want to wish all the mamas out there a very Happy Mother’s Day.”

“Hey! I’m Jordan Davis, wishing all the mothers out there a very Happy Mother’s Day. Love ya, Mom.”

“Hi! This is Josh Turner, wishing you a Happy Mother’s Day.”

“Hey! It’s Kacey Musgraves. To all you mothers out there, Happy Mother’s Day!”

“Hi everyone, it’s Keith Urban. Hoping all the mothers out there have a very, very Happy Mother’s Day. Love ya, Mom!”

“(ALL) Hi! This is Little Big Town. (KIMBERLY) We want to wish all you mothers out there a Happy Mother’s Day. I love ya, Mama!”

“Hey! It’s Luke Bryan, hoping all you mothers out there have a Happy Mother’s Day.”

“Hey everybody. I’m Maddie & I’m Tae and we’re Maddie & Tae, wishing all you mothers out there a very Happy Mother’s Day. I love ya, Mom.”

“Hey! This is Sam Hunt, wishing you a very Happy Mother’s Day.

“Hi! This is Shania Twain. Happy Mother’s Day.”

“Hey y’all, it’s Travis Denning, wishing all the mothers a very Happy Mother’s Day. Love you, Mom.”

Maddie & Tae (title of EP) OC: (Maddie) …started it for us. :59
TAE: “We chose ‘One Heart to Another’ to be the title track because when we wrote it, it was a really special day. We were pretty much in between our deals at the point and were very confused and very just insecure as people, and songwriters and a duo. And you know, it was just one of those days we went into a writing room and just didn’t care what anyone would think about the music we were writing. We just thought ‘You know what? Let’s write something that means something to us, and let’s say stuff we’ve never said, be bold, tell the truth.’ So, that really is what shaped the entire record at that point. Was just kind of being bold and being unapologetic about it, and so ‘One Heart to Another’ just fit that perfectly.” MADDIE: “And it is one heart to another. It’s our heart to our fans. So, it was kind of that song means a couple of different things. Like Tae said, writing ‘One Heart to Another’ gave us the confidence to continue on and to continue with this project. So, it’s our little song that started it for us.”

Carrie Underwood (Southbound) OC: …done with it. 1:00
“We get in a room, and I had the title. I was like this sounds like fun, I think. We can do something fun with this. But then you realize how tricky for some reason it is to be a woman and write like kind of a drinking party boat song. It’s strange. You wouldn’t think it would be any different, but I’m like for some reason I feel like a guy could get away with saying this line that we just threw out there, but I can’t for some reason. And I used Katie in the song as an example. So, Katie, we wanted to make her like have a little too much fun, but for every line we came out with, it was like well we don’t want her to be like – we don’t want it to be sad. We still had to make Katie have a little respect but wanted to just get it out there that some people were having too much fun. It surprisingly took us a while to write it but by the end of it, it was like, ‘Well, this is a lot of fun.’ I feel like everybody kind of gravitated towards that one when we were all done with it.”