The 2025 CMA Awards celebrated the record country music fans haven’t stopped listening to since its release.
Lainey Wilson took home her first CMA Award of the evening during the Wednesday, November 19, ceremony at Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, Tennessee, earning Album of the Year for her 2024 LP, Whirlwind.
“Mom and Daddy, look, check it out!” Wilson began. “I was absolutely not expecting this.”
She went on to give a shout-out to her fans before thanking her label, band and country radio. “I have the best fans in the world,” she told the crowd. “They showed up every single night singing every single word off of this record.”
The “Hold My Halo” artist, who was also the ceremony’s host, added that she wrote Whirlwind while her life was “constantly changing” as her fame rose. “I just remember being that little 11-year-old girl who would come home from school and pick up my guitar and pour my heart and soul into that guitar, and that’s how I navigated and communicated,” she recalled. “And that’s exactly what I did these last two years of my life when I felt like my life was changing but I still felt exactly the same.”
Other nominees in the Album of the Year category included Megan Moroney’s Am I Okay?, Zach Top’s Cold Beer and Country Music, Post Malone’s F-1 Trillion and Morgan Wallen’s I’m the Problem.
Moroney, 28, and Wilson, 33, led the pack with six nominations each at the 2025 awards show. In addition to Album of the Year, Moroney was in the running for Female Vocalist of the Year, Single of the Year, Song of the Year and Music Video of the Year for “Am I Okay?” and Musical Event of the Year for “You Had to Be There” with Kenny Chesney, while Wilson contended for Entertainer of the Year, Female Vocalist of the Year, Single of the Year and Song of the Year for “4x4xU” and Music Video of the Year for “Somewhere Over Laredo.” (Prior to the live event, both artists lost Music Video of the Year to Ella Langley and Riley Green’s “You Look Like You Love Me.”)
Top, 28, racked up five CMA Awards nods, including for Male Vocalist of the Year, New Artist of the Year and Single of the Year and Song of the Year for “I Never Lie.”
For his part, Wallen, 32, earned nominations in three categories, including Entertainer of the Year and Male Vocalist of the Year.
Although Malone, 30, trailed behind his Album of the Year competitors with two total nods, he was already a winner prior to the 2025 awards show, taking home Musical Event of the Year for his and Blake Shelton’s song, “Pour Me a Drink,” before the live ceremony began.
Of the 2025 contenders, Wilson was the only previous Album of the Year winner for Bell Bottom Country in 2023. The year before, her album Sayin’ What I’m Thinkin’ lost the category to Luke Combs’ Growin’ Up in 2022.
As for Wallen, he was previously up for Album of the Year twice. His Dangerous: The Double Album fell to Chris Stapleton’s Starting Over in 2021, and One Thing at a Time was defeated by Wilson’s Bell Bottom Country in 2023.
Moroney, Top and Malone each earned their first Album of the Year nominations in 2025.
Leading up to this year’s ceremony, Wilson already had nine CMA Awards on her shelf, Wallen had two and Moroney and Malone each had one. Top, for his part, landed his first-ever career nominations in 2025.
