Cody Johnson Praises Jelly Roll, Gets Crashed By Jelly Roll, Expecting Baby Boy & More | ACM Awards 2025 - video Dailymotion

Billboard

Cody Johnson caught up with Billboard's Lyndsey Havens & Tetris Kelly at the ACM Awards 2025.

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00:00What's up, brother?

00:02Oh, we're good.

00:02You know what's so funny?

00:03I'm liking the little bling right here.

00:04Thank you, thank you, thank you.

00:05We were just talking to Jelly.

00:06He voted for you.

00:07He shouldn't be telling people that.

00:09He's not telling everybody.

00:10Oh, here he is.

00:13You can't tell everybody you voted for me.

00:14Who do you want?

00:15We all know.

00:16I told everybody.

00:17I know.

00:18Every interview.

00:19They're like, Jelly Roll said he voted for you.

00:20I'm like, I know.

00:21He told me on my bus.

00:22I should have came after you.

00:24But I had to come tell you that I voted for you again.

00:26I appreciate it, dog.

00:27Well, now that he's standing in front of you, man,

00:29what makes this guy so great?

00:30What makes him the entertainer of the year?

00:31Well, I've told this story a bunch, but one, we'll get there first.

00:33But I want to say this.

00:35One of the most important moments of my career,

00:37I won my first award at the CMTs,

00:39and the first person I've seen in that moment of my life was this cowboy.

00:43And he hugged me like we grew up together.

00:46I get emotional thinking about it.

00:48I mean, literally, I never felt more accepted.

00:52And I was such a fan anyways.

00:53And I have a lot of acquaintances in this room,

00:55but I don't have any fucking friends.

00:56That's my brother.

00:58Appreciate it.

00:58He's the entertainer of the year because he preaches the gospel.

01:01He works harder than everybody.

01:02He tours the entire world.

01:04He does it unapologetically.

01:05He doesn't ask any help from anybody for anything.

01:08He does it his way and his way only.

01:10He makes no compromises, takes no bullshit.

01:12And then he goes straight home,

01:14and he's a husband, a father, and a fucking farmer.

01:16That's why he deserves to be the entertainer.

01:18Hell, yes.

01:19I love you, baby.

01:20Wow.

01:21Let me get out of here.

01:22I'm going to get emotional.

01:23He just wrote your acceptance speech.

01:26Like, if you don't go to the church of Jelly Roll, have you been to church?

01:30It's like, my goodness, man.

01:31That's a preacher.

01:32That makes me want to cry.

01:34That was probably one of the nicest things anybody's ever said about me.

01:37Well, I'm going to flip the script a little bit, if you don't mind.

01:39You know, what makes him just as worthy of entertainer of the year in your eyes?

01:43Because he's unapologetically himself.

01:45You just saw it.

01:46Yeah.

01:46He's not going to – you can judge him all you want to.

01:48You can judge his past.

01:49You can look at his face tattoos and say, I know what he is.

01:52You don't know what Jelly Roll is.

01:53And he's so normal.

01:54He's such a normal person that we've talked a lot about struggling with, you know,

01:58anxiety or pressure and things like that.

02:00And he's not coming into country music saying, I'm going to chase this because it's going to make me rich and famous.

02:06No.

02:07He said, I'm Jelly Roll.

02:08This is the way I look.

02:10This is the way I sound.

02:11This is the way I'm going to act.

02:12This is the way I'm going to be.

02:13And, man, that's how legends like Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson are made.

02:17Oh, dude, love that, man.

02:19What would a win – we all know who's voted for you now.

02:23What would a win for Entertainer of the Year mean to you, though?

02:26Oh, man, I don't know.

02:28It would be the culmination of the last 20 years of my life.

02:31I remember being on tour in a van with 12 guys and not having enough money to buy a McDonald's.

02:37Oh, my God.

02:38And I had $100, but I put it into the gas tank to go to the next show to, you know, make the next $100.

02:44And having a wife at home that missed me and was pregnant and couldn't pay my bills.

02:49She was working two jobs.

02:51And so you take that to seven nominations, and I think it would – I'm a cowboy.

02:55I chase gold buckles.

02:56That would be the country music gold buckle.

02:57And, I mean, you're just talking about being in bands, dude.

03:00Stadiums.

03:01That's crazy that you're about to play stadiums, man.

03:03Like, how do you prepare something that large and to be in front of that many people at once?

03:07I've been preparing my whole life.

03:08Every bar I ever played, every honky-tonk I ever played, every theater, I always said,

03:12there's a stadium somewhere near here.

03:14And we would play amphitheaters where you could see the stadium off in the distance.

03:18And I would tell my guys, have fun tonight.

03:21But that's where we're going.

03:22That's where we're going.

03:23And I think that drive and determination, I don't care if it takes 40 years.

03:27I'm still hooked.

03:28Yep.

03:29And it goes.

03:30Guys, we just went to the Church of Jelly Roll, now the Church of Cody Johnson, man.

03:33Thanks for all the preaching.

03:35Good luck tonight, man.

03:36Thank you very, very much.

03:38Thank you, of course.

03:39And my wife's pregnant with our little boy, so.

03:41What?

03:42What?

03:43Even more congratulations.

03:45Congratulations.

03:45That's awesome.

Cody Johnson Praises Jelly Roll, Gets Crashed By Jelly Roll, Expecting Baby Boy & More | ACM Awards 2025

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