Eric Church is still really mad about Garth Brooks lip-syncing at the CMAs

Eric Church is madder than a wet hen, and apparently he’s been that way since November.

The “Creepin” singer appears on the cover of the August issue of Rolling Stone magazine and, in the accompanying cover story he revisits the controversy over Garth Brooks lip-syncing at last year’s Country Music Association awards show.

He and Brooks were both nominated for CMA “Entertainer of the Year” - and Brooks won.

“So the winner of the biggest category of the night lip-synced in the biggest moment on the show?” Church told Rolling Stone’s Josh Eells. “F**k that! And I didn’t like his excuse at all.”

Brooks didn’t try to cover up that he had lip-synced to “Ask Me How I Know.” He admitted it to reporters after the show, where he and Church performed.

“We made a game time call on whether to sing to a track or lip-sync,” Brooks said, according to The Tennessean in Nashville. “And we decided to lip-sync it.”

He said he was sick and had just done 12 shows in 10 days - a touring schedule the Nashville newspaper called “relentless.”

“We decided to lip-sync it because my voice was just not there, and we wanted to represent country music the best we can,” Brooks told reporters.

He took “considerable heat,” Rolling Stone wrote at the time.

“Somehow, the most controversial aspect of last week’s Country Music Association Awards had nothing to do with politics,” Emily Yahr, entertainment writer for The Washington Post, wrote at the time.

She noted how not only fans, but fellow county stars sounded off on the lip-syncing.

Singer-songwriter Anderson East tweeted “this truly offends me,” while Blake Shelton tweeted: “Hey @garthbrooks... I still love you.”

Church made it clear to Rolling Stone that when he performs, “we don’t use machines. We use instruments.”

He said he felt like, in explaining his decision, Brooks was “was speaking for the other nominees. I can speak for myself – I’m not lip-syncing. If I can’t sing, I won’t sing, or I’ll sing badly. But at least you’ll get what you get.”

Though Brooks has not publicly responded to this rehashing of the past, Church’s gloves-off interview with Rolling Stone has started a buzz in country music circles.

“It’s fascinating, honest and raw in a way we don’t see in 2018,” notes WQYK country music radio station in Tampa, Florida.

“Artists are always worried they’ll offend or alienate fans if they take a side. Eric is not one of them. Politics, guns, where country music is going ... nothing is off limits. It’s refreshing.”

This story was originally published July 26, 2018 at 2:35 PM.