Nation rapper and singer Shaboozey had a tough time hiding his confusion on the 2025 American Music Awards.
The ceremony, which aired on Monday, was the primary manufacturing of the present since November 2022 and was broadcast dwell from Las Vegas, Nevada. When Shaboozey took the stage alongside nation artist Megan Moroney to current the award for Favourite Nation Duo or Group, a curious second unfolded.
“Country music has been an important part of AMA history,” Shaboozey stated, studying off a teleprompter.
The pair continued with a quick homage to the style’s legacy on the AMA stage — till Moroney swerved into what some might name revisionist historical past.
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“And this award went to the Carter family, who basically invented country music,” she stated.
A bewildered Shaboozey paused barely and let loose a nervous giggle — all whereas giving a side-eye to what got here out of Moroney’s mouth. The “Good News” singer stayed skilled within the second and continued alongside together with his activity — however one might inform that he was nonetheless confused about what he simply heard.
Moroney was referencing the Carter Household, an American people music group typically dubbed “the first family of country music,” in response to the Nation Music Corridor of Fame and Museum.
However Shaboozey’s seen discomfort wasn’t with out context.
It echoed a longstanding rigidity throughout the nation music world — one the place the style’s historical past is commonly simplified, sanitized and scrubbed of its Black roots. The Carter household themselves have been influenced by a Black artist, Lesley Riddle.
Shaboozey turned to X, previously Twitter, to deal with the second, referencing Riddle and different musicians influential to the style.
