Did Shaboozey Just Throw Shade at the Carter Family at the AMAs?

Shaboozey let his eyebrows do the talking in one odd, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment at the 2025 American Music Awards on Monday night (May 26).

The “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” star was onstage with Megan Moroney to present the award for Favorite Country Duo or Group, a trophy that went to Dan + Shay.

But before they announced the winner, Moroney said a few words to the crowd about previous winners, including the Carter Family, “who basically invented country music,” she quipped.

Shaboozey didn’t say anything about that, but he furrowed his brow, looked at Moroney and then side-eyed to the crowd before breaking into an uncomfortable chuckle and leaning in to deliver his part of the speech.

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The awards show moved along without any further comment from Shaboozey, but that one look was enough.

Immediately, fans on social media started chiming in with their thoughts about what that expression on his face could have meant about Shaboozey’s thoughts on the Carter Family, Moroney or the state of country music in general.

“Shaboozey wrote a whole damn essay with that look,” one TikTok user said.

“That’s that ‘girl bye'” look,” another added.

Why would Shaboozey have a strong reaction against the statement that the Carter Family — who were active starting in the 1920s, and became one of the genre’s first big group of vocal stars — “invented” country music? Well, to understand that, you’ve got to do a little bit of a deep dive into some country music history.

Who Were the Carter Family?

• Founding members A.P. Carter, his wife Sara Carter, his brother Ezra Carter and Ezra’s wife Maybelle Carter began recording music together in 1927 in Tennessee.
• As the family group grew in popularity and expanded their lineup, they recorded country music standards like “Will the Circle Be Unbroken,” “Keep on the Sunny Side” and “Wildwood Flower,” establishing some of the first mainstream recordings of the songs that would become a backbone of the country music songbook.
• Maybelle’s daughter June Carter would become an especially prominent country music figure, both for her musical career and for her marriage to Johnny Cash. June was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2025.

Did the Carter Family “Invent” Country Music?

No — the Carter Family were one of several staple acts formative in the genre’s early decades, and they were certainly a massively influential force on what country music sounds like today, but country music was not invented by any one group or artist.

The genre’s historians have also put a bright spotlight on the Carter Family’s contributions, but haven’t always mentioned some of the other important artists that contributed to their work.

Specifically, TikTok users commenting on Shaboozey’s eye-roll at the AMAs mention Lesley Riddle, a Black musician whose unsung contributions to the Carter Family were central to their musical output. Riddle met A.P. Carter shortly after the Carter Family began recording in the 1920s, and the group recorded a number of songs that Riddle either wrote or transmitted during “song-collecting” trips that he and A.P. undertook as they traveled around Appalachia and the South studying the folk music of the region.

A number of comments on Shaboozey’s AMAs moment seemed to suggest that fans thought he might be pointing out that Riddle, and other Black performers central to the development of country music, never got credit for their contributions.

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“Invented, stole, same thing,” one user wrote in response to Moroney’s comment that the Carter Family “basically invented country music.”

“When will they learn that African Americans created country music,” another viewer commented.

“The Carter Family was the first group to bring it to a wider audience, but they definitely didn’t invent the damn genre,” a third said. “They basically stole folk songs from all over the South and called it their own.”

Shaboozey hasn’t issued any official statement to clarify the meaning behind his side-eye, so it’s not entirely clear whether he met the expression as a protest against Moroney’s description of the Carter Family, or whether he simply thought it was a weird line to bring to an awards show.

It’s also worth noting that Moroney likely didn’t write the line that the Carter Family “basically invented country music.” Presenters give speeches onstage and typically read off a teleprompter.

But as one TikTok user pointed out, Moroney and Shaboozey likely rehearsed their speech beforehand, so her teleprompter lines wouldn’t have come as a surprise to him in the moment — unless she ad-libbed that particular line.

“Mind you, they rehearse beforehand so either she added that in or he was prepared to side eye!” that fan wrote.