The Academy of Country Music finally announced its nominees for New Artist of The Year, long after having announced the nominees for the annual award show's other categories. The list—which includes Brett Eldredge, Kip Moore and Justin Moore—have aggravated country music fans for a number of reasons. The first of which is that Justin Moore is far from a "new" artist.
The ACM awards feature a degree of flexibility similar to that of the Grammys: Just like Macklemore & Ryan Lewis qualified for the Best New Artist category despite having released previous albums, country performers can qualify for the New Artist of The Year trophy if they haven't had prior success. The problem is that Moore HAS had prior success, as his 2009 self-titled debut and his 2011 album Outlaws Like Me both sold more than 500,000 copies. The ACM's regulations require a performer to have sold less than 500,000 with previous releases to qualify as "new." The organization's CEO, Bob Romeo argued for the decision to nominate Moore.
"The Academy of Country Music Board of Directors - which I have been a part of for 25+ years - has a long history of supporting new country music acts," he said. "This decision is in line with our criteria, and the board's right to be flexible in our efforts to be inclusive vs. exclusive of a young artist who has had budding success. We have to remember that Justin is a new face to mainstream music fans, media, and the like."
The problem is "mainstream" music fans still don't know who Moore is, unlike what Romeo claims. People familiar with country music however HAVE been familiar with Moore since 2009.
No offense to Moore, but there's just not much justifying his candidacy in this category. Plus, his nomination means that two other performers, Kacey Musgraves and Lee Brice (who legitimately didn't have huge followings before their most recent albums), didn't get a nomination.
Of course, in the name of fairness, it's just as well that Moore got the New Artist nomination, as both Brice and Musgraves got five nominations in other categories, including Male and Female vocalist of the year, respectively.
