“Think country music, think cowboy-hat Brad Paisley” is a great quote about Brad Paisley.
His name is synonymous with country music.
He burst onto the scene with his debut album "Who Needs Pictures", which crossed the million mark - and it says it all about the talent and popularity of this country musician.
His music seamlessly fuses traditional country music with southern rock music.
His songwriting skills; some of his early work for other musicians were great hits and proved to be career saviors.
The appeal of his songs lies in the frequent appeal to pop culture and subtle sense of humor.
He frequently tours by himself or with other musicians, performing opening acts for other leading artists or television programs.
He devotes most of his time to working on his albums, playing at social gatherings, or honing his songwriting skills.
In other words, this passionate musician's love of country seems to consume his time so intensely that a review of his career shows him as someone so devoted to music that he seems to be obsessed with it.
Childhood and musical beginning Brad Paisley
The singer was born on October 28, 1972 in West Virginia. Brad was born to Edward Douglas, an employee of the West Virginia Department of Transportation, and Sandra Jean Paisley, a teacher.
When he was eight years old, his maternal grandfather gave him a guitar and taught him how to play.
By the age of 12, the young musician was singing in church and social gatherings and playing in his first band, called Brad Paisley and the C-Notes, for which he wrote his own material.
Paisley eventually took a permanent seat on a popular country music radio show at the Jamboree, USA.
He was so popular with listeners that he was invited to join the program as a full-time musician, opening up for acts such as The Judds and Roy Clark.
He won a scholarship to the University of Belmont and interned at ASCAP, Atlantic Records and Fitzgerald-Hartley.
There he met with Frank Rogers, Kelly Lovelace and Chris Dubois, with whom he had a successful working relationship, more on that ..
After two years at West Liberty College in West Virginia, Paisley transferred to Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee.
At Belmont, Paisley studied on an American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers scholarship and met Frank Rogers and Kelly Lovelace, who would both help Paisley later in his career.
A week after the release of the radio show, Paisley signed with EMI Records as a songwriter. His first hit came with a 1996 hit for David Kersh called "Other you".
“Who needs pictures” and “Glory”
Paisley made his debut as a solo artist after signing with Aristoy. He released his first album Who Needs Pictures in 1999.
The record produced the No. 1 hit "He Should Not Have Been" followed by the single "We Danced". The album sold over 1 million copies and catapulted Paisley to stardom.
The following year, the Academy of Country Music (ACM) named Paisley Best New Male Vocalist and the Country Music Association (CMA) gave him the prestigious Horizon Award.
In February 2001, Paisley was inducted into the Grand Ole Opry. A few months later, he received his first Grammy Award for Best New Artist.
He also released his second album, Part II (2001), which contained his cheeky and memorable No. 1 single "I'm Gonna Miss Her (The Fishing Song)".
Three other songs on the album, "I Want You To Stay", "Wrapped Around" and "Two People In Love" also reached the top ten in the country charts.
Album: 5th Gear
Teaming up for a recording session, Paisley and Underwood duetted "Oh Love" on their next release, 5th Gear (2007). Reaching number one on the country's album charts, the album featured several No. 1 hit singles, including Online, Letter to Me, and I'm Still a Guy.
Paisley also won several major awards that year, winning the ACM award for Best Male Vocalist and the CMA award for Male Vocalist of the Year. He also received his first Grammy Award for the instrumental track Throttleneck.
Play: The Guitar Album
Paisley's next album, Play: The Guitar Album, was released in November 2008. It featured musicians such as Keith Urban, Vince Gill and B.B. King. Paisley and Urban received 2008 CMA Artist of the Year nominations for their duet.
Although their performance didn't win, Paisley walked away from the awards with repeated awards for Male Vocalist of the Year and Best Music Video of the Year.
He also made a splash that year as co-host of CMA, along with Carrie Underwood, the first of many years that the pair had teamed up to host the ceremony.
In 2009, Paisley released his American Saturday album. The first single from the album, "Then", became Paisley's 14th hit. His next studio effort, This Is Country Music (2011), featured a duet with Underwood on the track "Remind Me", as well as a performance with the band Alabama on "Old Alabama".
And thanks to the song "Random Racist", the album debuted at the top of the Billboard charts, but quickly lost momentum. In 2014, Paisley returned to a more carefree village life with moonshine in the trunk.
The Voice
In the summer of 2015, it was revealed that Paisley would mentor Blake Shelton's team on Season 9 of The Voice.
Paisley also performed at a concert to celebrate the 90th anniversary of the Grand Ole Opry, with footage slated for release in a documentary later in the year.
In October 2016, Paisley released a new song, "Today". It was the first single from his 11th studio album, Love And War, which also featured Mick Jagger and John Fogerty.
During the This Is Country Music tour, Paisley also starred in various show programs, including the Cars 2 soundtrack and a South Park guest spot.
He also published a music-oriented memoir called "Player Diary", co-written with music journalist David Wilde.
Album: Wheelhouse
After completing the tour, he began work on his ninth album, Wheelhouse.
An ambitious genre-shifting album, the record was preceded by the singles "Southern Comfort Zone" in the fall of 2012 and "Beat This Summer", which was released a month before the release of Wheelhouse in April 2013.
Wheelhouse made a good debut - again hitting number one on the Billboard country chart and number two on the top 200 - but was soon consumed by news media controversy regarding his album track "Random Racist".
His follow-up single "I Can't Change the World" barely cracked the country's Top 40 and its successor, "Mona Lisa", performed marginally, peaking at 24; the album itself did not receive gold.
In the year Wheelhouse was released, Paisley returned with a new single, "River Bank", which peaked at number 12 in the country charts.
Its companion album, Moonshine in the Trunk, was a solid country album and included duets with Carrie Underwood and Emmylou Harris. It became his eighth album in a row, reaching number one on the country chart, and peaked at number two on the pop chart.
The album's second single "Perfect Storm" hit the top four, but subsequent "Crushin' It" and "Country Nation" failed to crack the top ten.
In the summer of 2016, Paisley returned with "Without a Fight", a duet with Demi Lovato that was intended as a teaser for his 11th album.
When Love and War came out in April 2017, preceded by the top ten single "Today", "Without a Fight" was not on the recording, but there were duets with Mick Jagger and John Fogerty.
The album peaked at number one on the country chart and peaked at number 13 on the Billboard 200.
In 2018, Paisley joined the roster of artists for King of the Road.
Personal life Brad Paisley
Paisley met actress Kimberly Williams in 2001 after he wrote a lyric about meeting her. He then made a video to accompany the single and Williams agreed to appear.
The couple got married in 2003, and in 2007 they had their first joint child, namely a son, whom they named William Hackleberry.
On April 17, 2009, their second son was born, who was named Jasper Warren Paisley. In general, a strong friendly family that loves country music.
