Brad Paisley and Carrie Underwood are returning to host the CMA Awards for their tenth year Wednesday night, and the powerhouse duo is sure to bring the laughs.
The duo have pretty much perfected their presentation over the years, often starting the show with a monologue song highlighting some of the biggest pop culture moments of the year. Throughout their run, they’ve poked fun at Tim McGraw and Faith Hill, performed the viral “Gangnum Style” choreography and invited a few special guests on stage.
Videos by PopCulture.com
Keep scrolling for a few of the pair’s most memorable hosting moments.
2011: Tim and Faith get plastic
Tim McGraw and Faith Hill are one of country’s biggest couples, and Paisley and Underwood decided to pay homage to the famous duo by bringing out dolls that Mattel had made earlier that year in the likeness of the pair.
Exchanging gifts onstage, both Paisley and Underwood unwrapped their respective doll, with Underwood squealing, “Faith Hill Barbie! OMG!” Paisley yelled, “Tim McGraw Barbie! Tim McGraw Barbie! Can we play with these now?”
The duo then decided to see whether the dolls were anatomically correct, cracking jokes as Hill and McGraw played along from the audience.
2014: Paisley spills the beans
In 2014, Paisley spilled the beans on the sex of Underwood’s unborn child, revealing that the singer and husband Mike Fisher were expecting a boy. At a CMA Festival event in June, Underwood shared that she and Fisher initially wanted to keep the news to themselves, but figured that since she’d likely spill the beans by accident, she might as well be in on the reveal.
“I guess we might as well blow it together,” she said, via PEOPLE.
During the show, Underwood pointed out Garth Brooks, saying, “Do you think he’ll sign my baby?”
Paisley replied, “Yeah, that would be great! Hey we could name him Garth!” And then …”Oh, dammit!” Underwood responded with faux anger, “What is wrong with you?”
2009: Coming for Kanye
The duo kicked off their now-infamous tradition of parody songs during their one of their very first hosting gigs, spoofing “Mamas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys,” tweaking the lyrics to call out Kanye West, who earlier that year had interrupted Taylor Swift at the MTV VMAs.
The new lyrics read, “Mamas don’t let your babies grow up to be Kanye/ Let ’em pick guitars and drive them old trucks/Cowboys have manners — they don’t interrupt.”
2012: ‘Gangnam Style’
The duo performed the choreography to Psy’s viral song during the 2012 show. Ahead of the day, the duo worked with a choreographer to get the moves just right.
“We needed help,” Underwood said, although she noted the performance wasn’t meant to be perfect. “It was more like, we just want people to know what we’re trying to do. The worse we do, the funnier it would be, right?”
As the song began to play during the duo’s speech, Underwood urged Paisley to resist the urge to dance, but he couldn’t do it.
“It’s happening!” he said, donning sunglasses as the pair launched into the dance.
2011: Saluting ‘Star Wars’
The world was re-introduced to the Star Wars franchise in 2015 with the premiere of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, and Paisley and Underwood paid tribute with a star-studded opening.
With Underwood dressed as “Princess Carrie Fisher” and Paisley as “Guitar Solo,” the duo broke to the news to Little Big Town as the Cantina Band, Darius Rucker as Storm Trooper and Luke Bryan as “Garth Vader” that the bit was canceled. At the end of the segment, the hosts were surprised by William Shatner, who revealed himself to be dressed as a Storm Trooper before delivering a few jokes of his own.
Photo Credit: Getty / Taylor Hill
