Artists That Begin With A

Jason Aldean

Mon, 14 Dec 2009 15:52:00 GMT

For anyone looking to brand Jason Aldean as part of a significant musical movement, good luck.

There’s a lot about the singer that’s become familiar during his five years as a country hitmaker, after all, he has spent more weeks at No. one on the radio charts than any other country artist in the last 12 months. But none of what he does comes out quite like anyone else. The blues-tinged licks at the end of his phrases—there’s a ring of familiarity about them, but you can’t really link them to another artist. The smoky guitar riffs that have become a signature—they’re built on sounds that have come before, but they don’t really belong to anyone else in the country genre, either. The small-town themes that pervade many of his songs—that’s all been done before, but not quite with the unwavering honesty that Aldean applies to the subject.

Since his 2005 debut with the scorching “Hicktown,” the singer has set himself apart from the pack as a truly unique artist. He addresses his Georgia-born brand of country music with a singular vision, and he intends to keep it that way.

“The whole thing about being creative is coming up with new things,” he says matter-of-factly in a converted barn on his Nashville-area farm. “What makes you different and more creative than the other guys is taking something to an extreme and making it better without ripping anybody else off. I think that’s the key. The great ones figure it out and are constantly evolving, and that’s what makes ‘em great.”

With My Kinda Party, the Academy of Country Music’s former Top New Male Vocalist further cements his uniqueness with a robust15-track project that builds on his personal past while covering new territory. The first single—the muscular title track—fit very quickly into the jacked-up portion of his concert set list, which already boasts “She’s Country,” “Crazy Town” and “Johnny Cash.” But there’s other stylistic landscape to explore, too—his first full-fledged duet, with big-voiced pop singer Kelly Clarkson; and an almost rap segment in “Dirt Road Anthem” that suggests Aldean has listened to a little Snoop Dogg in his time.

That might come as a shock to non-country observers who think the genre belongs in its own self-imposed hay-bale ‘hood, but Aldean gets around musically. He was the first country artist of any significance to incorporate Guns N’ Roses medleys into his live show—“You’re welcome” is his simple response—and his listening history includes such diverse talents as Aerosmith, the Oak Ridge Boys and even Tupac Shakur.

Like Aldean himself, all of those acts were founded on a distinct musical identity. They each incorporated their heroes’ influences into a sound that belonged to no one else. Aldean took his cues from them quite well.

“I grew up listenin’ to all kinds of music—rock and Southern rock and country and blues and rap stuff, too,” he says. “My cousin, who’s five months older than me, he went through his rap phase when we had 2Pac in the car all the time. Really, I’m a fan of all kinds of music.”

While critics will gravitate to the extremes on My Kinda Party, the essence of the album is simply the solidity of its material. By selling 3.5 million records in the first phase of his career, Aldean commanded the attention of Nashville’s songwriters as he put together music for the album. With volumes of Music Row’s best craftsmen and women writing for Aldean, he literally had the pick of the litter.

As a result, My Kinda Party is stocked with inviting melodies and intriguing storylines, many of them tugging on the small-town themes that have become the backbone of his persona. “Fly Over States,” “Church Pew” and “Tattoos On This Town” exemplify Aldean’s affection for the topic, though it’s often misunderstood.

While country has plenty of bumper-sticker anthems that celebrate small communities, Aldean is more than a simple cheerleader for rural values. He does indeed take on the role of heartland defender in “Fly Over States,” but other songs find him grappling with the heartbreak and limitations that accompany towns with three- and four-digit populations.

“I’m not like a pro-backwoods, flag-wavin’ kinda guy,” he says. “I mean, I grew up in the South, in the country, and I love that lifestyle. But I’m not one of those guys that insists that’s the only thing there is. Being from a small town, you can be a little misunderstood, and there are plenty of people tryin’ to get out of there because you’re put in a box a lot of times when you’re in a small town.”

Aldean knows that issue well. Born in Macon, Georgia, he was raised on the outskirts of town and devoted much of his youth to working and hanging out at his cousin’s 200-acre farm.

“I spent every weekend out there at his house riding four-wheelers and horses, bailin’ hay, going fishing and hunting—all that stuff,” Aldean reflects. “When I would go from my house to his house, it was a lot of farmland and dirt roads and huge potholes in the road.”

A high-school athlete, he made use of his environment by playing clubs, building his musical skills with an eye toward Nashville. Once he hit Music City in 1998, Aldean struggled rather famously, signing several recording contracts that eventually fell apart. He played countless label showcases and eventually drained his bank account.

As dramatic as it sounds, he was ready to pack it up and go back to Georgia when producer Michael Knox asked him to take one more crack at a showcase. Independent Broken Bow Records was interested, and Aldean—admittedly skeptical that a then-unproven company was going to make a difference in his life—took that shot.

Everything clicked at that show. Aldean got a deal that kept him in Nashville, and his life has never quite been the same. But his brush with permanent obscurity still fuels his creativity.

“I think about it every day,” he concedes. “When you read that I was this close to leaving, it sounds like something made up. But it was the truth. I had applied for jobs in Georgia, and I was trying to get hired down there. We were broke—just straight-up broke—and we were gonna move in with my mom so we could get on our feet and get straightened out…maybe get a club gig and try to build a local following.”

Instead, the Broken Bow deal allowed Aldean to stay in Nashville and build up a following on a national level. Establishing a mindset that he continues to carry, he tackled his opportunity on his own terms. He worked with his own producer, Michael Knox, and used his own band—guitarist Kurt Allison, bass player Tully Kennedy and drummer Rich Redmond—plus guitarist Adam Shoenfeld as his studio core.

Aldean’s ultra-Southern voicings give him an immediately identifiable sound. The band helps set him even further apart from other country stars.

“I don’t want to use who everybody else uses,” he insists. “And I don’t want my records to sound like everybody else’s records. The only way to do that is to cut it like we do. I cut the album with my band, I use an engineer that nobody else really uses in this town to cut major-label records, and Michael is starting to produce more things now, but when we first got started, it was me and that was about it.”

Even now, as Knox branches out to work with other well-known country artists—an opportunity that’s come directly from producing Aldean—Knox and Aldean have an understanding about protecting the sound they’ve achieved together.

“I just went to him and said, ‘Hey, look, man, this is something that we’ve been working 10 years on. I’m not going to just hand it over so you can make everybody else’s stuff sound like mine. That’s what sets us apart.’ He understood that, and that was pretty much it.”

There’s no cockiness and no forcefulness in his stance. The name of the game is individuality, and Aldean is protecting it.

He also appreciates it in other artists. That same level of uniqueness is exactly what Aldean was looking for when he approached Clarkson as a duet partner on “Don’t You Wanna Stay.”

“Kelly has such a distinct voice,” he observes. “She’s got the most soulful voice there is right now. As soon as she opened her mouth and started singing in the studio, it was like, ‘That is what this song is supposed to sound like!’”

The one-of-a-kind sound Clarkson brought to “Don’t You Wanna Stay” is representative of Aldean’s own artistry throughout My Kinda Party. There’s a cultural familiarity to the themes and the influences, but in practice, there’s not another act who sounds quite like Jason Aldean.

He’s not part of some musical wave. He is his own movement.

“That’s what it’s all about,” he shrugs, “knowing what it is that sets you apart from everybody else.”

Find Jason on the web:

Trace Adkins

Mon, 24 Jan 2011 22:11:00 GMT

In the fifteen years since his platinum debut, Trace Adkins has released ten studio albums, three greatest hits packages, thirty chart singles. He has racked up four Grammy nominations, five ACM and CMT awards. Accolades like that – along with sales in the tens of millions – explain the respect Adkins has earned from both Country fans and the industry alike.

But there’s more. In recent years, Trace has made his mark as a TV and film actor, a voiceover artist, an author, a social commentator, a participant on NBC’s Celebrity Apprentice — and even the inspiration for a series of comic books.

Along the way, Trace has endured his share of well-publicized tribulations and the release of his latest album – Proud To Be Here – would be saddled with the same loss (and luck) that have shadowed Trace all his life. In June of 2011, as the finishing touches were being made to the upcoming album, the Nashville-area home Adkins shared with his wife and three of his five daughters was entirely destroyed by fire. True to form, Trace thought first of his family’s safety, then steered the outpouring of fan’s support toward the Red Cross…then got back to work.

Adkins’ strength, focus and passion for fully-lived life infuse every bit of his new project. Proud To Be Here is the perfect distillation of Trace’s art, displaying once again his ability to pour emotional truth into his music, whether it is of the tender or the rowdy variety. The project celebrates committed love in songs like “Million Dollar View,” “That’s What You Get,” and “Always Gonna Be That Way,” the joys of the simple life in “Days Like This” and “Poor Folks,” the lighter side in “It’s A Woman Thang” and “Love Buzz,” and life’s highest priorities in “It’s Who You Know.”

“There’s so much on this record that’s autobiographical,” says the man with the soul-stirring baritone. “I draw from the best writers in town, and time after time they capture things I’ve experienced.”

The CD’s title track is a case in point.

“Chris Wallin, Aaron Barker and Ira Dean wrote that song for me,” he says. “I’ve been close to death several times in my life, and they know me well enough to know what I’ve carried away from that.”

Perhaps nowhere, though, do life and art come together as poignantly as they do with the project’s first single, “Just Fishin’.” The ode to father-daughter togetherness captures Trace’s own approach to fatherhood—he taught his daughters to fish—and the video, filmed at the family’s farm, where the family moved after the fire, features his youngest, Trinity.

“I think the reason she was so comfortable in the video,” he says, “is because it’s her place. It has been all her life. All of these people with the cameras and equipment were coming for a play day at her farm and that’s the way we approached it.”

In addition to the ten songs on the regular CD, fans wanting more can purchase a 14-song deluxe edition including four more tracks—two penned by Trace—or a 16-song package including those four plus two live cuts available at Target stores. The additional songs include Trace’s “Semper Fi,” dedicated to the Marine Corps, and “If I Was a Woman,” a hilarious duet with buddy Blake Shelton, who teamed with Trace for the chart-topping “Hillbilly Bone.”

For all but the first single, which was produced by Michael Knox, Trace worked with co-producers Mark Wright and Kenny Beard.

“Kenny was tireless in finding songs and in forcing me to put my nose to the grindstone, which resulted in me writing more than I would have otherwise,” he says. “And once we were in the studio, he’s just so much fun to work with because he loves the process and it’s contagious. This was the first time I got to work with Mark in the studio, and I really liked his level of participation. He’s on the musicians’ side of the glass, putting himself in the center of the room, and I think that helps cement a feeling of teamwork.”

The album is the latest in a career that continues to soar. With “Just Fishin’,” Trace adds to a collection of hits that includes modern classics like “(This Ain’t) No Thinkin’ Thing,” “Then They Do,” “Hot Mama,” “Songs About Me,” “Honky Tonk Badonkadonk,” “Ladies Love Country Boys” and “You’re Gonna Miss This.” It extends a journey that began in his hometown of Sarepta, Louisiana, and led through college football, the offshore oil fields of the Gulf of Mexico, the region’s honky-tonks and finally to Nashville, where he was signed while playing in a small club in a working-class neighborhood.

His stardom, which includes membership in the Grand Ole Opry, is of the multi-media variety. He has received the fan-voted Top Video of the Year award three times on GAC, “Honky Tonk Badonkadonk” was voted #2 Video of the Decade by CMT, and Trace has been voted “Country’s Sexiest Man” by the readers of Country Weekly. He has turned his entertainingly articulated views on a variety of current topics into a seat on any number of TV talk shows, and into a well-received book, A Personal Stand: Obervations and Opinions from a Freethinking Roughneck. He has narrated any number of TV documentaries and has been a commercial spokesman for products ranging from Kentucky Fried Chicken to BC Headache Powder. The comic book character he inspired, McBain, was featured in four well-received editions.

Trace has appeared in many TV shows, including “King of the Hill” and “My Name Is Earl,” and in movies ranging from 2008′s “An American Carol” to 2011′s “The Lincoln Lawyer.” He has performed often for military personnel, including two tours through the Middle East with the USO, which has given him its Merit Award. He has taken part in an “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” episode that rebuilt a home for a Dallas SWAT team member badly injured in a shooting, and he has performed in honor of those who died on United Airlines’ Flight 93 on 9/11. Trace raised three-quarters of a million dollars for the Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Network and is a spokesman for the Wounded Warrior Project. His charitable endeavors earned him the 2010 Artist Humanitarian Award from Country Radio Broadcasters.

Still, he knows where he is planted.

“There are times when my schedule can’t accommodate both music and the rest of what I do,” he says. “Would I ever focus more on that and walk away from what brought me to the dance? No. I’ve always chosen to stay with what I do best, and I think that’s the smartest thing I can do.”

His ever-growing legion of fans would surely concur.

Find Trace on the web:

Steve Azar

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 16:00:00 GMT

Steve Azar was born and raised in Greenville, Mississippi at the entrance to the Mississippi Delta. His mother was raised above the family grocery store located on Highway 61 in Clarksdale, MS near the infamous “Crossroads”. “The Crossroads” is the intersection of Route 61 and Route 49, or the 61/49 split as they call it there, in Clarksdale, Mississippi, made famous in the Robert Johnson song, “Cross Road Blues”. This is where Delta Blues legend Robert Johnson supposedly sold his soul to the Devil in exchange for mastery of the blues, or so the story goes. Mom’s younger brother grew up to be the mayor of Clarksdale, MS. Two of Steve’s cousin’s, Abe and Pat Davis, own and operate the famous Abe’s barbeque. Located right at the 61/49 split, Abe’s is also where you see the famous “Crossroad’s” sign with the huge guitars. Rock and Blues legends from all over the world make the pilgrimage to Clarksdale to stand at the Crossroads, and many stop in for a bite at Abe’s while they are there. Abe’s is famous, and delicious. Steve’s dad owned the first legal liquor store in the state. Behind that liquor store is where Steve first learned about the blues music of the Delta.

“I was hooked on Eugene Powell (Sonny Boy Nelson) who made Blues records back in the 1930’s,” says Steve. “I would hang out behind my dad’s liquor store, sit on a crate and listen to Eugene sing about his day and about his night before. Those were some of my first lyric writing lessons, even though I didn’t know it at the time.”

“It was all around us down there, and I was hooked on what it was they were talking about. Little Milton, Sam Chatmon and Roosevelt (Booba) Barnes all lived, or hung out there. B.B. King was from Itta Bena and Albert King was raised in Indianola, both towns are out on Highway 82 from Greenville. When my early band started growing and we were up to three trucks to carry all the band and gear, Little Milton would say , You really gonna’ do this Little Azar! (that’s what he called me) It wasn’t a question, he was telling me, and he saw me actually doing it. He told me, If you’re gonna’ do this, you gotta’ make it your whole life, you gotta’ work hard everyday at it!”

“I work hard at it everyday… I love the work I get to do!”

“Where I grew up in the Delta, there was always something new that came into my life and inspired me to write music. Whether its pain, hope, joy, laughter or sadness, there are always emotions that you experience, we all do. I’ve written about those emotions since I was about 11 years old.”

While attending and then graduating from Delta State University, Azar was also busy touring with his band. Steve had become a regional headliner playing the biggest clubs in the Delta, was a regular on the college campus circuit, and played nearly every Blues Festival.

It was a sweltering September afternoon during the Delta Blues Festival at Freedom Village in his hometown of Greenville; MS. Steve was humbled to share the stage with Delta Blues music legend, James “Son” Thomas, in a tribute to Stevie Ray Vaughn. Upon finishing the set, Steve walked off the stage, where blues legend Mr. Albert King said to him, “Hey kid, you got it! …. Where ya’ goin’ with it?” Azar said, “Nashville Mr. King.” With a smile, and a bit of sarcasm, Albert exclaimed, “Ahhhhh, the Devil goes to Nashville!”

Azar did move to Nashville and within days had multiple song publishing contract offers. During the time that followed, Steve began working on his own songs, writing with the “who’s who” of Nashville great songwriters, and developing his unique way of storytelling that led to some classic songs in the following years.

It took a bit longer to achieve what Steve considers his first “real” recording deal, eventually signing as a performer to major label, Mercury Nashville. His 2002 full-length release, “Waitin’ on Joe” really put Steve on the country music map. “I Don’t Have To Be Me til’ Monday” was the first single from that record and reached #2 nationally on the country radio charts. “I Don’t Have To Be Me til’ Monday” is still a power recurrent at radio today and is one of the Top 5 most played songs of the last decade at country radio. BMI has honored Steve with their “Million-Air” award and “Monday” has received almost 3 million spins on the radio since release. His next single was the title track from the record, “Waitin’ on Joe”. “Waitin’ on Joe”, the song, became a Top 10 radio hit and reached #1 on the CMT video charts. “Waitin’ on Joe” reached into Steve’s Mississippi roots for the story of life on the river, and featured his Mississippi friend, Academy Award Winning Actor, Morgan Freeman, to help tell that story of life in Mississippi. There were several years of working radio and touring that followed the release of “Waitin On Joe”. The single “Monday” lasted almost a year on the charts alone.

The next few years brought a down time for Steve Azar, due largely to throat surgery which sidelined him from recording and playing live. This hiatus gave Azar time to write songs and do some real soul searching about his career direction.

After a long recovery and new-found sense of direction, Steve arrived back with his first release, Indianola (2006).

Named after a town just down the road from Steve’s hometown in Mississippi, and the birthplace of the great, Albert King, Indianola was the debut release from his own independent music label, Dang Records. “You Don’t Know a Thing” and “You’re My Life” both enjoyed success at country radio. The video for “You Don’t Know a Thing” featured golfer, John Daly, and was an instant favorite at the country music video channels. “You’re my Life”, is still a strong seller and fan favorite to this day. “Indianola” also received strong critical reviews and landed the album at #1 on the XM Radio “Country Outlaw” channel, bumping Willie Nelson out of the #1 spot, and then giving up the #1 spot to John Mellencamp the next week.

In 2007 Azar was personally chosen by Bob Seger to open his U.S. tour which was ranked by Pollstar Magazine the #1 tour in America that year. Steve received many standing ovations from enthusiastic crowds, including one at Madison Square Garden. Reviews of Steve’s show were great, like the Columbus Dispatch reviewer who wrote, “Azar has the inflections and rhythms of a young Bob Dylan…”

“Slide On Over Here” followed in 2009 and represented the beginning of a new chapter of Steve’s musical journey. “Moo La Moo” was the first single from 13-track effort and both the song and the video enjoy chart success, catapulting Azar back in the Top 40 on the country charts. “Sunshine” soon followed and won not only critical praise, but set a record for highest charting song from a true independent label on the Billboard Activator chart. . It achieved Top 20 success on all the country radio charts and landed the #1 spot on the GAC-TV Top 20 Video Countdown. It also was fan voted at #29 on the “GAC-TV Year End” favorite videos for 2010. Further still, “Sunshine” remained active on the radio charts for nearly 40 weeks, a proud accomplishment for both Steve and his young label. Still in recurrent airplay around the country, “Sunshine” proved Steve’s ability as a songwriter to reach listeners with his lyrics about human emotions. When asked to pick her favorite song of 2010 by People Magazine’s Country Edition, Taylor Swift picked Steve’s song, “Sunshine,” explaining “It’s so sensitive and sweet. It comes from a place of vulnerability, and I love hearing that from a guy”.

On Memorial Day 2011, Steve released “Soldier Song” a tribute to our soldiers and their families. Instead of another song about war, “Soldier Song” speaks of the personal lives interrupted by those that serve, and their families left behind. “Soldier Song” was chosen by Fox News Channel and used as the theme music behind their Memorial Day special on “Special Report with Bret Baier which featured President Bush’s time spent mountain biking with a group of amazing soldiers. Steve dedicated a portion of the proceeds from this song to the soldiers by joining forces with his friend, NFL star Jared Allen and his charity, “Homes 4 Wounded Warriors.”

Steve has relocated home base back to the “Delta” of Mississippi. More than half of Steve’s live show has always been filled with music of his Delta home, and his songwriting and recording reflects his Delta music upbringing. Steve is especially proud of his on-going connection to Mississippi.

In 2003, Governor Ronnie Musgrove and legislature declared March 13 as Steve Azar Day in the great state of Mississippi.

Second Crossing: Mississippi’s Landmark Bridge is a MS PBS documentary about the rebuilding of this historic bridge following Hurricane Katrina. . The construction of this new crossing over America’s most storied river will be chronicled in the documentary, which Steve, a Greenville native, narrates.

Steve was one of the stars of Mississippi Rising, a benefit event at Ole Miss for the victims of Hurricane Katrina in 2005. He shared the stage with his old friend Morgan Freeman, plus Sela Ward, Samuel L. Jackson, The Mississippi Mass Choir, Faith Hill, Ray Romano, Jason Alexander and Lance Bass.

Fast forward to today, where Steve currently records with his own label, renamed, Ride Records. The label name “Ride” is derived from some advice Steve received from his friend, Little Milton. He told me, “Little Azar, you’re in for the Ride of your life”, Azar recalls.
Comprising a small team of experts with miles of music biz experience, Ride Records continues to go from strength to strength and blazes its own trail in the jungle that is today’s music industry.
In early fall of 2011 Steve will release “Delta Soul Volume One”, a collection of songs that are an exceptional mix of Delta blues and rock.

Find Steve on the web:

Lauren Alaina

Wed, 25 Jul 2012 17:44:00 GMT

Lauren Alaina’s debut album, Wildflower, is a vibrant bouquet of compelling stories, powerful emotions and soaring vocals that is as irresistible and delightful as Lauren herself.

Lauren captured America’s heart when she appeared on American Idol earlier this year and revealed her enthusiasm, humor and warmth, as well as a commanding voice with an impressive range that has been compared to the genre’s premier vocalists, including Carrie Underwood and Martina McBride. She helped make the show one of the most popular yet. A record-breaking 122.4 million votes were cast for the finale, which garnered 29.3 million viewers, as well as 38.6 million who tuned in to see the winner’s name announced. She signed her record deal shortly thereafter and began recording her debut album with producer Byron Gallimore.

The result is a fitting musical portrait of the 16 year old’s personality, optimism and life experiences. There’s sauce and sentimentality, as well as an unwavering hope for the future and a belief in true love. “Wildflower is the perfect name for my first album,” she says. “I would consider myself a wildflower because wildflowers are sweet, but then they have a little bit of spunk to them – they are ‘wildflowers,’” she says. “I like to have a lot of fun and I’m really sassy.

“I tried to get songs that were all different so everyone would have a part that they liked because people are different,” she says. “I tried to make it so that it would please everyone. It’s just me; that is what the album is: it’s Lauren Alaina. That is the common thread.”

Lauren’s inimitable spirit is showcased in “Georgia Peaches,” a fun celebration of Southern girls that proclaims, “Love to dance and we love to flirt, ain’t afraid of a little dirt.” Lauren says, “I am a Georgia peach. Even if you aren’t from Georgia, you can appreciate it because it’s the type of song that will get you up off of your feet and dancing.”

Lauren co-wrote “Funny Thing About Love” with Brett James and Luke Laird after discussing her own romantic experiences with them. “I feel like it turned out really great and I’m excited to see how people will respond to my own style of writing, as well as my style of music, period. It’s about when you like someone and they don’t like you, and when you don’t like them anymore, they like you. Timing is everything. When you are young, it never really works out. You are always on a different page.”

“Growing Her Wings” explores the coming-of-age quest for independence through the tale of a teenage girl who reads Cosmopolitan magazine, against her mother’s wishes, after she’s grounded for kissing the boy next door. “She’s growing her wings behind closed doors and she’s ready to fly away,” Lauren says. “I felt like that is who I was six months ago and I’ve formed my wings and I’m flying.”

In “She’s a Wildflower,” she encourages girls to believe in themselves by recognizing the beauty they possess. “As a teenage girl, you are your own worst critic,” says Lauren, who admits that she hasn’t been immune to self-doubt. “When I first heard the song, it made me want to cry because I know what it was like to be the freckled-face girl with a gap in her teeth,” she says. “Girls always put themselves down when they are really wildflowers and need to go for it.”

While she’s always 100 percent pro-girl, she’s not afraid to put flashy and shallow boys in their place, as she does in “I’m Not One of Them.” But she describes the innocence of young love in “Tupelo” and sings the praises of nice guys in “One Of Those Boys,” in which she reveals a weakness for jeans-wearin’ country boys who mind her curfew and love their mamas. “I am singing about a boy who is perfect, but he has all of these flaws that make me love him.”

“The Locket” is a poignant song about the power of love, both between a man and a woman and a grandmother and her granddaughter. “The grandmother has Alzheimer’s and she is starting to forget things and the granddaughter is reading out of a diary what has happened in her life,” she says. “It tells this beautiful story about these two people who fell in love when they were young kids and they grow old together.”

Lauren was surrounded by love and music as she was raised in Rossville, Ga., by her father, J.J., a chemical technician, and mother, Kristy, a transcriptionist. Her mother and older brother, Tyler, sang and her father is a multi-instrumentalist. Her parents played country and rock music in the house and Lauren favored music to television, especially Shania Twain, Aerosmith and the Dixie Chicks.

When she was 3, her mother was listening to the Dixie Chicks’ “When You Were Mine” until she turned the car off, but Lauren kept singing, hitting every note and word perfectly. Her mother bought the karaoke version of the Dixie Chicks for Lauren to sing to as she sat on the bar where they ate breakfast at Lauren’s grandmother’s restaurant.

Her first public performances came with a kids’ choir as well as an annual vacation spot that offered karaoke. Word soon spread about her talent and she began receiving invitations to perform. Beginning in elementary school, she routinely landed the lead roles in school plays.

At age nine, she wrote her first song, “She’s a Miracle,” after her aunt was in a car wreck. She sang in church, restaurants, family holiday gatherings and anywhere else. Says Lauren, “I would grab up every opportunity I could,” Lauren says. “I would go karaoke at any place within a 30-mile radius of where I lived. I would drive an hour just to sing. Any competition I would hear about I would enter.”

At age 8, she entered the talent competition of the Southern Stars Pageant and won, and the next year was selected to perform on the Kids talent stage at Chattanooga’s Riverbend Festival. She continued to perform on that stage annually until age 12, when she won the competition that allowed her to perform on the festival’s big stage. At age 10, she won the American Model and Talent Competition in Orlando, beating out 1,500 kids. She later joined the Georgia Country Gospel Music Association’s children’s group that performed at places such as Six Flags.

“I started coming to Nashville when I was about 12,” says Lauren, who enjoyed a normal childhood of playing softball, cheerleading and working at a pizza parlor. “I would go into the bars on Broadway before 6 p.m. and walk up to the people on the stage and ask if I could sing and they would let me.” Offstage, she was continuing to develop as a songwriter. Little did she know that she would be returning to Nashville to sign a major label record deal.

It was during Idol that she first heard her debut single and first hit, “Like My Mother Does.” “When they started playing it for me, I started crying because I went through this whole crazy journey and the only person who was there for me every step of the way was my mom. She didn’t get any praises for it and I got all of the attention. I thought the song would be a great way to say thank you for her for all that she does for me. When she came in and heard it, she cried. It was a sign. Everybody was crying, even the piano player.”

This year has been one of the most incredible and emotional years of her life. "When you are 16, you change a lot from the time you are 16 to 17 to 18. I got to change on national television, so everybody watched me grow up over the past year.

"I feel like people are going to continue to get to watch me grow up. It's cool that I have been able to meet so many people that I otherwise would have never been able to meet. I have been able to accomplish so many goals, like being on American Idol and releasing a single and now my first album. I know there is more to come in the future and I can't wait to see how everything unfolds."

Find Lauren on the web:

Katie Armiger

Wed, 25 Jul 2012 06:27:00 GMT

Katie Armiger

Newcomer Katie Armiger's powerful vocals and skillful songwriting are clearly showcased on her new music. At the ripe age of 20, Katie does not hold back and has an inspiring combination of determination and passion that shines through in her music.

Rarely do you hear of a young artist whose vocal ability and talent is compared to the likes of seasoned country artists like Sara Evans and Martina McBride, but Katie Armiger, who burst onto the country music scene is just that.

"I think some people look at me as a young girl who is unsure of what I want or my own mind. But that's not really the case. I know exactly what I want, and I hope you can figure that out by listening to this album."

Confident, secure, bold, assertive, vulnerable and in-your-face could all describe the songs on the new album, Confessions of a Nice Girl, as well as the artist who sings them. Katie Armiger, who released her first album when she was just 15 years old, has amassed a collection of songs on her third album that touches upon just about every emotion imaginable - love, infatuation, anger, sadness, hurt, happiness - and she is unabashedly unapologetic in showcasing her feelings, whatever form they may encompass.

The 20-year-old singer-songwriter has accomplished more during her four years as a recording artist than most people twice her age. Her previous single, "Kiss Me Now," the flirtatious ode to new love she co-wrote with Sarah Buxton and Blair Daly, was her second to hit the Top 40 on the Billboard Indicator Chart, while "Trail of Lies" landed in the Top 20 on Music Row, setting a record as the Highest Charting Independent Female Artist in 2009.

Katie also earned the title of the Highest Charting Independent Female Artist of 2008 on R&R with "Unseen," and the young lady with the enviable voice set yet another record for the highest debut for a solo independent artist since 2003 on the Music Row chart with her debut single, "17 in Abilene," in 2007.

The dream of making it on Music Row seemed fated for the Texas native with the soaring voice and radiant personality, reminiscent of Martina McBride, Shania Twain and Sara Evans. At the ripe old age of 10, Katie discovered a talent for arranging her thoughts and feelings into writing songs and poetry. Honing her craft, Katie also realized she could put those songs and poems to music and perform them with understated conviction.

When she was 14, she entered Houston's Best Country Singer competition sponsored by Radio 93Q Country, and after eight weeks, she took home the grand prize and a shot at recording a two-song demo, which developed into her self-titled debut album. After gaining a little more experience and spending more time on the road opening for such hit makers as Jason Aldean, Craig Morgan and Luke Bryan, Katie came with her critically acclaimed sophomore effort, Believe.

Now with the release of Confessions of a Nice Girl on Cold River Records folks will not only get a peek into her psyche, but a good long look at the mind of a woman who has encountered love, heartbreak and resentment. "I recorded my second album when I was 15, and between 15 and 19, there is just a huge difference," declares Katie. "Within those years, your life changes you can fall in love and fall out of it, go on tours and live life in that time span that you couldn't even imagine."

Her enthusiasm for the new music is immediately evident, almost contagious. She wrote or co-wrote nine of the 13 songs on the disc, sharing talents and ideas with some of Nashville's most innovative tunesmiths, such as Sarah Buxton and Blair Daly ("Kiss Me Now," "Leaving Home," "Scream"), Rebecca Lynn Howard ("That's Why") and Joe West ("Can't Keep Myself From Loving You"). Katie has really upped the ante over the past four years, totally giving herself over to the music. "I can't really tell you an exact moment when it happened," Katie muses over the growth in her songwriting. "I just feel like when you're writing and living life and going on tour, you grow. When you grow, you become more comfortable in your skin and your likes and dislikes, and that's what helps you become more confident. When you as a person become more confident, I think it definitely translates into songwriting, because songwriting is an expression of self." She tossed four of her own songs off the disc to make room for four she did not write ("Nice Girl," "Ain't Gonna Happen," "Can You Handle It" and "Strong Enough") because of just how well they embodied her own thoughts.

The album's title, Confessions of a Nice Girl, was chosen by her fans in a contest held by television network Great American Country (GAC). "I've been working on this album for such a long time now, writing and preparing and recording," admits Katie. "I never expected it to be as hard as it was to name the album. I sat down with my label and we were talking about options, and I made a list of my favorite titles and couldn't narrow it down to just one. So, we got together with GAC and they came up with the idea of having a contest and having fans vote for the title."
One song on the new album with more meaning today than a year ago, is her self-penned "Leaving Home," which she wrote as a tribute to her mother right before she made the permanent move to Nashville at the beginning of 2010.

"I've always known that singing was my dream and it's what I wanted to do, but it's definitely extremely hard to leave your parents," she says of "Leaving Home" used by more than 20 high schools in the nation as their graduation song. In the achingly sweet video, clips of old home videos and family photos are shown all the while Katie is reassuring her mother she will not fall victim to the trappings of fame.
Confessions of a Nice Girl begins with the perky and happy melody of "Best Song Ever," a tune she co-wrote with Amanda Flynn and Bruce Wallace, that belies the darker undertones of what is really going on in the mind of this young woman.

On the opposite end of the spectrum are the flirtatious tales of infatuation and new love, "Kiss Me Now" and "Can't Keep Myself From Loving You." She teamed with renowned guitarist Charlie Sexton (Bob Dylan, Stevie Ray Vaughn) to produce the lovely "I Will Be," which she co-wrote with Lisa McCallum, and the heartache portrayed by Katie is so palpable you can cut it with a knife. "Working with Katie is so much fun," says Lisa. "She is the most down-to-earth artist I've ever worked with, and is not only extremely talented, but a great person." Having a handful of strong female songwriters on the album in Sarah Buxton, Katrina Elam, Rachel Proctor and Rebecca Lynn Howard has pushed Katie to a new level of artistry. "They're amazing songwriters, because they let you express whatever you're feeling and build around that," marvels the singer. "So, when you get in there, all they want to do for 30 minutes is talk about where you are in your life, where you are in relationships, anything like that. They sit down, they get inside your mind and just take apart different things you're feeling, and that's what you write about. So, I think that's why the songs you write with them and that they write are so good, because it's just raw emotion right there [in your face]."

Speaking of raw emotion, take the heart wrenching "That's Why" and "Cry, Cry, Cry" about the aftermath of a breakup or the rockin' Rachel Proctor-Bruce Wallace collaboration "I'm over you, and I'm moving on" song, "Ain't Gonna Happen," showcasing a different side of the sweet-tempered singer, along with the guitar-driven, down-and-dirty "Ain't So Sweet,' an alliance with the Three Kings, otherwise known as Jason Aldean's band. The guys not only appear on the track, but also co-produced it with Katie. That brings us to "Nice Girl," the inspiration behind the title of the album. "My definition of a nice girl is somebody who is always sweet, and they are nice to everybody they meet. No matter how bad or good the situation is, they're going to look at the positive side, which is what I always try to do," she says, with a slight twinkle in her eye.

Katie chose award winning engineer Chad Carlson, who is also a popular audio engineer and has won a pair of Grammys for his contributions on Taylor Swift's Fearless. "I love making music with Katie," says Carlson. "I can't remember being more excited about a project I've worked on.Katie has the soul of someone that's experienced more than her share of life's ups and downs and the passion for music that inspires me to love music."

Confessions of a Nice Girl is exactly that - a peek inside the mind of a nice girl, and a chance to glimpse what's really behind that smile. "These songs are a mixture of things that have happened to me or emotions that I felt," says Katie. "You know, maybe a guy dumped me and did all these horrible things like cheat on me. I feel you can have the same emotion in many different forms. I truly believe this is the best music I can create and I hope everyone finds something different in the songs.

Katie Armiger has just scratched the surface of what she is capable of. She is a passionate and driven performer well beyond her years.

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Gary Allan

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 15:28:00 GMT

“I ain’t really happy,” sings Gary Allan on “Get Off on the Pain,” the down-home masterstroke that begins and provides the name for his new MCA Nashville collection, “until the sky starts driving rain.” Unhesitatingly frank, mercilessly guitar-crazed, it’s the rocked-out country confession of a smart guy drawn to what the rest of the world calls wrong roads and long shots, or complains of as aching bones and stubbornness, or — as Allan sings in a spectacular stretch of drawn-out soulful vowels — underestimates as dark horses. And as the California-born superstar releases his eighth studio album, it’s about the most Gary Allan piece anyone could imagine.

“That’s, like, very autobiographical,” Allan understates, talking about the song. “I feel like I’m living that right now. It’s got a lot of life in there for me: It represents the relentless quality of life on the road. You’ll never hear me singing about tractors or farms, just because I don’t know anything about that stuff. Wrong roads and dark horses I know about. Still, I think the pain can get to be some kind of a positive for me because it connects to everything I’ve ever dreamed of. While it’s relentless, it’s confirmation of the actual existence of this big musical drama, the result of the dream.”

That dream, for Allan, was to become exactly what he has become over the course of a lifetime in the field: a singer and songwriter forever cognizant of country music’s rough and storied past yet never wholly enslaved by its stylistic or social traditions. As a teenager performing in California, he skipped the bars that didn’t want to hear him play George Jones music; as a Nashville artist, he never worried about rocking things out or missing an awards-show red carpet. “It’s almost become a challenge to get into this town. But I’m also really comfortable with where I am, being slightly on the outside.” Allan always has developed and continued to refine his own tattooed power and finesse.

But none of it has ever confused him. “I just wanted to be viable and, I guess, prove that the viable stuff can be necessary,” Allan says, and if his career often has seemed less loud and permanently neon-lit than those of some of his peers, Allan has indeed achieved a robust viability, consistently hitting all the gold and platinum sales benchmarks by which those kinds of determinations are measured. “I remember talking about this when I first got signed to a Nashville major label,” Allan says. “Even then I was able to say, ‘Look, I’m never going to be the latest greatest thing, because that usually goes straight up and then burns out.’ My goal was — and remains — to be like Willie Nelson or George Strait, people who consistently rise. I think because I’ve done this since I was a little kid that I want it to be in my life forever. I want to be like Willie, playing until I’m 70. That’s what I’m swinging for.”

With aspirations like that, Get Off on the Pain sure fits the bill, an eighth album that shows no signs of musical fatigue and, moreover, promises an undeniable future. Songs like the atmospheric “We Fly by Night,” the indestructible title track, and the dramatically cascading, deliberate “I Think I Had Enough” consolidate the strengths of previous Gary Allan music — the Orbisonesque elegance of “Smoke Rings in the Dark” (1999), the brute power of “Man to Man” (2001), the smarts of “Watching Airplanes” (2007). The album strikes out in different directions, too. This is country music from a guy who effortlessly can sing the wry, despondent “Kiss Me When I’m Down,” which imports elements of rock chamber-pop, into the same collection song cycle that contains the rollicking “That Ain’t Gonna Fly,” whose choruses taps the richest harmonic fundamentals of gospel music turning into pop.

Whatever style, these songs, produced by the award-winning Nashville music man Mark Wright, proceed with an unusual confidence. “They’re more focused,” Allan says. “Everybody just knows more of what we’re going for now, because I always use the same players in the studio; I’ve done that since day one. This is nine records, counting our Greatest Hits album, we’ve made together. So I think everybody just knows what I want. It’s just a lot easier. I’ve sat down and played those guys things on my guitar, trying to show what I wanted. I think just with time you just get better with it.”

A couple albums back, Allan did a triumphant version of Jessie Winchester’s “A Showman’s Life”; packing lifetimes of drama and consequence into his performance, he uncovered and demonstrated what it feels like to live your life on the road, day in and day out, to play music. “You beat yourself up pretty bad doing it,” Allan says. “There are lots of sacrifices, mostly personal, but it’s a rush.” Get Off on the Pain, is like a ten-song demonstration of Allan’s version of Winchester’s song. The album sums up and expands Allan’s fifteen years of Nashville music-making as it lately has arrived out of the frenetic pace of his jam-packed touring schedule.

‘I relate to the road,” he says. “It’s a relentless life you live out there. But it’s been my life for the last four or five years. Since Ange passed, it’s been like a healing process for me — a way to sanity, a way of keeping my mind on something else, namely my music.” The reference is to Angela Herzberg, Allan’s wife, who committed suicide in 2004 after suffering from depression and migraines; Tough All Over, Allan’s album from 2005, contained songs that addressed her death. “We were crying,” Allan says, “the whole time we were making it.”

Right now, Allan finds himself in a different although not disconnected place; the new collection climaxes with “No Regrets,” a ballad that retraces and reexamines some of those still-present 2004 emotions. “I feel like I’m always,” Allan says, “going to be writing songs about Ange.”

He returns to the notion of his road album being also his current career summary album. “It’s a consolidation of everything I’ve done, and what’s to come is the settling of Gary Allan,” he says. “I’m still not there. I’m still in a transitional state, healing and partying and trying to find out how we’re going to bring all this home — how to grow up, settle, find a place where I’m content. Some place I can go, I guess, to bring it all home, when it’s all done. I hope to be able to put it all on paper and in the sound waves so you can watch and hear it. That’s what I’ve tried to do with every record before this one. It’s the accumulation of it all. And right now, I feel like the ground is trembling.”

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