2012 ACM Awards Deliver Top Ratings

If you've ever wondered why more and more 'Country' award shows have been adding pop, rock and movie stars, here's the answer- higher ratings!

As more award presentations are cut from the on-air portion of award shows, and hall of fame and legend honors are moved to other off camera ceremonies, ratings continue to soar for 'Country' Music television award shows.  As a fan of traditional Country Music, it's a sad reality to accept, but the facts are the facts.  So I guess we have to suck it up and expect to see and hear Adele, Flo-Rida, Snoop Dogg, KISS, Lady Gaga, Maroon 5, OneRepublic, and Katy Perry on Country Music's biggest nights!  These artists are all great, but for every non-country act you add, you take the place of a Country artist who deserves the exposure on their own genre's television show.

According to Country Aircheck, the 47th Annual Academy of Country Music Awards propelled CBS to a win in Sunday's coveted primetime battle for adults 18-49, generating a 2.6 rating/7 share in the 8pm hour (12.8 million viewers), followed by a 3.2/8 (13.18m) and a 3.3/8 (12.95m) in the 9pm and 10pm hours, respectively. The telecast was a close second to ABC's Once Upon A Time in the first hour, but easily won the latter two, and scored by far the most viewers overall throughout the evening. In all, the awards telecast delivered a 3.1 rating 18-49 and 13 million total viewers for CBS, although that rating slipped 0.2 (-6%) from 2010 and was the show's softest ratings since 2008, according to Zap2it.com.