One of the most powerful ACM Awards performances in recent history â and it almost didnât happen.
We all know what was happening back in 2020. In fact, the ACM Awards were not only postponed from April to September due to the COVID pandemic, but the performances were spread out between the Grand Ole Opry, Ryman Auditorium and the Bluebird Cafe after originally being scheduled to take place in Las Vegas.
And COVID wasnât the only thing that was going on: Not only were we in the middle of a heated presidential election, but the summer of 2020 also featured unrest and protests following the death of George Floyd that had the country more divided than at any time in recent memory.
Over the summer, Eric Church had released his latest single âStick That In Your Country Song,â which was obviously recorded before 2020 but seemed perfect for the moment as it addressed some of the major social issues of the time, while calling out country music for largely lacking substance and ignoring the problems that we were facing as a nation:
âSing about the man coming back from war
23 going on 54
He lost a friend, his sight, his hands
Baby girl heâll never see again
Stick that in your country song
Take that one to number one
And get the whole world singing along
Stick that in your country songâ
It was only natural that Church would perform the song on the ACM Awards, and it immediately became one of the standout performances, starting with Church strumming quietly onstage to Johnny Cashâs âRagged Old Flagâ before launching into a full-throttle, in-your-face performance of his newest single.
Itâs a performance that people are still talking about, and one that will be remembered (and re-watched) for years to come.
But it almost didnât happen.
In an interview with Country Aircheck Weekly, ACM Awards Executive Producer RAC Clark tells the story of how the performance came together, starting with a work tape that Eric sent him in July featuring the âRagged Old Flagâ intro leading into âStick That in Your Country Song.â
But once they tried to turn that work tape into an ACM performance, they hit a roadblock: They couldnât get permission to use âRagged Old Flag.â
âAs we got into it, we found the Cash estate and publishers are very protective. No matter how much talking I did trying to get it cleared, it was a corporate wall.â
Clark then suggested that Eric try appealing directly to Johnny Cashâs children. So thatâs what he did.
Eric wrote a letter to John and Rosanne Cash explaining his idea for the performance. And while Clark wonât share its exact contents, he credits that letter as the reason that they were ultimately able to use âRagged Old Flagâ for the performance.
In addition to getting permission to use Johnny Cashâs performance of the recitation, Clark also had to get some help from an executive at BMG, which controls the publishing rights to âRagged Old Flag.â They then worked directly with Johnny Cashâs estate for approval on the images of Cash that were used during the video that played during the intro.
As for the recording of Cash that they ultimately used, Clark said that particular performance came from a recitation that Johnny Cash did without instrumentation for a Ralph Emery special that they were able to clean up so that Eric could perform his own acoustic background music.
While there were a lot of moving pieces and quite a few legal hurdles that had to be cleared in order to make the performance happen, ultimately it all came together for one badass moment that wonât soon be forgotten.
As Clark put it:
âThere was a lot of sweat equity by a lot of people. Part of my job is to bring these things to life, but this was Ericâs vision.
He pushed it over the top, and boy, did he deliver.â
Did he ever.