Country singer Vince Gill once came close to trading his guitar licks for actual fisticuffs with a legendary radio host who decided to take aim at his wife, Amy Grant.
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“Everybody that meets her is crazy about her,” the “When I Call Your Name” singer told Phil Rosenthal and David Wild on their Naked Lunch podcast on March 5. “I remember when we were first getting married, I was really good friends with [radio host] Don Imus … And he was, you know, he was a character, and he’s loved me forever and me and Delbert McClinton were his favorite, two of his favorite singers.”
However, Gill said that after he and Grant tied the knot, Imus promptly “flipped” on him. The shock jock “kind of turned on me and started running me down and ragging me on his show every morning.”
“’I can’t believe my favorite singer, Vince Gill, lost the Baby Jesus, married that Christian girl,’ and blah blah blah. So, he was just wearing my a— out,” Gill recalled.
When Gill released a new record shortly after, he told his publicist to book him on Imus’ show.
“And they said, ‘Are you nuts?’ I said, ‘No.’ I said, ‘I want to go do the show.’ And they said, ‘Well, he’s ragging on you every day.’ I said, ‘I know.’ And so I got booked on the show,” the “One More Last Chance” singer recalled.
Vince Gill Recalls Telling Don Imus, ‘I’m Going to Kick Your A—’ Over Amy Grant Remarks
During the appearance, Gill sang a song and made some small talk before the inevitable happened: “and then finally Amy’s name came up.”
“He said something about Amy, and I said, ‘I’m glad you brought Amy up,’” Gill continued. “I said, ‘I’ve been hearing you say some pretty ugly things about my wife, and I’m just kind of curious why.’ I said, ‘You used to be a great supporter of mine’ and this and that.”
Gill then pointed out that Imus had never actually met Grant.
“I said, ‘Well, if you ever met her, you’d never say an unkind word about her,’” Gill recalled. He then told Imus, “‘I’m going to shoot you straight.’ I said, ‘I really only came on this show for one reason.’ I said, ‘We’re either going to talk this out, straighten this out,’ I said, ‘or I’m going to crawl across this desk, and I’m going to kick your a—.'”
Imus’ “eyes got big,” Gill explained, adding the radio host suggested they should “figure this thing out.”
“I said, ‘Good choice, Don,’” Gill recalled shooting back, likely while squinting his eyes and chewing a matchstick.
However, after the confrontation, the singer and Imus buried the hatchet.
“So we had a great visit, and I left the studio and was headed home, and I turned on his show, and he was still on, and I heard him say, ‘I don’t know why I was giving that guy so much crap. I love that guy,’ you know, and he completely turned, and we stayed great friends until his passing,” Gill explained.
Imus passed away in 2019.
Meanwhile, Gill and Grant celebrate their 26th anniversary this year.