Artist Source: Billboard.com, JeremyLesley.com and official websites.

Clint Black's Official Website


A country music traditionalist from Texas, Clint Black was one of the first artists to kick-start the mass-market popularity of country in the '90s. Black is also one of the first artists of a generation that was equally inspired by rock-oriented pop -- like '70s singer/songwriters and '60s rock & roll -- as well as country artists like Merle Haggard, Bob Wills, and George Jones. He offered a shiny, marketable version of traditional country and in the process paved the way for a new generation of country artists, particularly Garth Brooks. After Brooks broke through into the pop mainstream, Black's career began to fade somewhat, but he remained one of the most popular and acclaimed vocalists of the '90s. Black was born in New Jersey but raised in Katy, TX, a suburb of Houston. As a child, he listened to both country and rock & roll, but he didn't begin playing guitar until the age of 13, when he started playing harmonica. Two years later, he began writing songs, as well as performing in his brother Kevin's band, where he played bass and sang. In the early '80s, he began busking on the streets of Katy, eventually working his way into coffeehouses, bars, and nightclubs. In 1987, Clint met Hayden Nicholas, a guitarist and songwriter who had a home studio. Nicholas and Black began collaborating together, writing songs and recording demos; Nicholas would become the bandleader for Black, playing lead guitar and co-writing a large majority of his hit singles. A tape of their songs made its way to Bill Ham, the manager of ZZ Top. Impressed with the tape, Ham became Black's manager; the singer had a contract with RCA Nashville by the end of 1988. "A Better Man," Black's first single, was released early in 1989 and it went to number one -- he was the first new male country artist to have a number one hit with his debut single in 15 years. Black was an immediate sensation throughout country music and he played the Grand Ole Opry in April, one month before his debut album, Killin' Time, was released. Killin' Time was an immediate hit, going gold within six months and spawning four other hit singles, including the number ones "Killin' Time," "Nobody's Home," and "Walkin' Away." At the end of 1989, he won the Country Music Association's Horizon Award, as well that organization's Best Male Vocalist Award. He also won Best Album, Best Single, Best Male Vocalist, and Best New Male Vocalist awards from the Academy of Country Music and the NSAI Songwriter/Artist of the Year Award. By the end of 1990, Killin' Time sold over two million copies in America. Black released his second album, Put Yourself in My Shoes, in 1990. Like the debut, Put Yourself in My Shoes was a major success, spawning four Top Ten hits ("Put Yourself in My Shoes," "One More Payment," and the number ones "Loving Blind" and "Where Are You Now"), selling over two million copies, and peaking at number 18 on the pop charts. Even though it sold well, it didn't receive the same critical acclaim as the debut. Nevertheless, Black was named Best Male Vocalist that same year. Throughout 1990, Black was on tour with Alabama and appearing on television shows across the country. In 1991, several singles from Put Yourself in My Shoes charted and he was inducted into the Grand Ole Opry. On New Year's Eve of 1991, he married the television actress Lisa Hartman. Black began 1992 in a lawsuit with his manager. Black claimed that his original contract gave Ham too large of a percentage of the singer's royalties and publishing rights. For seven months he was embroiled in the lawsuit, during which he was recording his third album. By the summer, the suit was settled and his new album, The Hard Way, finally was released. The Hard Way received positive reviews and became an immediate hit, peaking at number two on the country charts and crossing over into the pop Top Ten. The first single from the album, "We Tell Ourselves," reached number one that summer. Black began a lengthy world tour in June of 1992 to support The Hard Way. Although it was a success, The Hard Way wasn't as popular as Black's first two records, selling no more than a million copies. Released in 1993, No Time to Kill, his fourth album, continued the stagnation in his record sales, even though its sales were more than respectable -- the album went platinum and spawned the hit single "When My Ship Comes In." During the fall of 1994, Black released his fifth album, One Emotion, followed a year later by the seasonal effort Looking for Christmas. Nothin' But the Taillights appeared after a two-year hiatus, and in 1999 Black celebrated a decade of recording with D'Lectrified. Several hits collections followed into the new millennium. In 2004, Black returned with Spend My Time, his first batch of new material in over six years, closely followed by Drinkin' Songs & Other Logic in 2005. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide

Earl Thomas Conley's Official Website

Early in his career, Earl Thomas Conley's music picked up the label "thinking man's country." An accurate description -- Conley looks into the heart and soul of his characters, finding the motivations for their actions and beliefs. In the process, the astute listener can find fragments of himself/herself in nearly any Conley creation. Born into poverty in Portsmouth, OH, Conley struggled with the limits of his social class. He aspired to be a painter or actor, but found that his aspirations for music lingered after the other interests died down. Influenced by everyone from Hank Williams to the Eagles, Conley delved into the details of writing, trying to learn the craft by following the rules and regulations of the Music Row songwriting community. Eventually, torn by the limits of the "law," he found his own niche by breaking many of those same rules. His public self-analysis -- in both his songs and his interviews -- has proven inspirational to some, bothersome to others, but Conley has evolved stylistically, even though the "thinking man" label continues to follow him. He's admittedly chased a more commercial sound, with a certain degree of success, but the run for the dollars also put him into a financial bind. He spent part of the late '80s and early '90s overworking himself to pay off his debts. Although he has been a hitmaker for more than a decade, his contributions to country have often gone almost unnoticed. The son a railroad man, Conley left his Portsmouth home at the age of 14, once his father lost his job. After living with his older sister in Ohio, he rejected a scholarship to art school, deciding to join the Army instead. While he was in the military, he fell in love with country music. Following his discharge, he worked a number of blue-collar jobs while he played Nashville clubs at night. Conley wasn't making any headway, so he relocated to Huntsville, AL, where he worked in a steel mill. While in Huntsville, he met Nelson Larkin, a producer who helped the fledgling singer sign to the independent label GRT in 1974. Over the next two years, he released four singles on the label -- which were all credited to "Earl Conley" -- and each one scraped the lower regions of the country charts. While his chart success was respectable for a developing artist, he was soon eclipsed by other artists who were having hits with his songs. Nelson Larkin gave his brother Billy "Leave It Up to Me," which became the first Earl Thomas Conley song to reach the Top 20. It was followed shortly afterward by Mel Street's number 13 hit "Smokey Mountain Memories" and Conway Twitty's version of "This Time I've Hurt Her More (Than She Loves Me)," which reached number one in early 1976. By that time, he had moved to Nashville, where he was writing for Nelson Larkin's publishing house. In 1977, Conley signed with Warner Bros., and in early 1979 he had his first Top 40 hit, "Dreamin's All I Do." By the end of the year, he had begun performing and releasing records under his full name, Earl Thomas Conley. None of his Warner singles became big hits, and he left the label at the end of 1979. After spending six months reassessing his career and musical direction, he signed to Sunbird Records and began working with Nelson Larkin again. Conley's first single for Sunbird, "Silent Treatment," was an immediate Top Ten hit late in 1980, and it was quickly followed by the number one "Fire and Smoke" early in 1981. Following his breakthrough success, RCA signed Conley to a long-term deal. "Tell Me Why," his first single for the label, reached number ten in late 1981, followed shortly afterward by the number 16 "After the Love Slips Away." In the summer of 1982, "Heavenly Bodies" kicked off a string of 21 straight Top Ten hits that ran for seven years. During that time, he had a remarkable 17 number one hits, including a record-setting four number one singles from 1984's Don't Make It Easy for Me -- it was the first time any artist in any genre had four number one hits from the same album. Though he had some financial and vocal problems during the mid-'80s, the hits never stopped coming during the entire decade. By the end of the '80s, he had stopped working with Nelson Larkin, preferring to collaborate with Randy Scruggs, which brought his music back to his country and R&B roots. His sales took a dramatic dip during 1990 due to the rise of contemporary country, but he had two new Top Ten hits, "Shadow of a Doubt" and the Keith Whitley duet "Brotherly Love." The singles set the stage for the harder-edged country of his 1991 album, Yours Truly. Despite receiving some of the best reviews of Conley's career, the record was a commercial failure, and RCA dropped him shortly after its release. For much of the '90s, he was without a record label, yet he continued to give concerts and to tour, finally landing on Intersound for 1998's Perpetual Emotion. ~ Tom Roland, All Music Guide

Sister Hazel's Official Website

Formed in 1993, Sister Hazel is an acoustic jangle pop band based in Gainesville, FL, featuring vocalist/guitarist Ken Block, guitarist/vocalist Andrew Copeland, lead guitarist Ryan Newell, bassist Jeff Beres, and drummer Mark Trojanowski. The group released an eponymous debut in 1994 before moving to the majors for their second album, Somewhere More Familiar, in 1997. The track "All for You" topped the adult alternative charts that summer, nearly reaching the pop Top Ten as well; its success pushed the album to gold sales status and a Top 50 chart position. Sister Hazel returned in the summer of 2000 with the follow-up album Fortress, again released through Universal, and scored a minor radio hit with the song "Change Your Mind." The album failed to match the band's early success, however, and Sister Hazel was no longer with Universal by the early 2003 release of their next album, Chasing Daylight. They returned a year later with Lift, and despite Sister Hazel's absence from the airwaves, the group continued to cultivate a respectable grassroots following. Absolutely appeared in October 2006. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide

Little River Band's Official Website

When Little River Band formed in 1975, Australia immediately took notice. The key band members were already well-known to Australians. Lead singer Glenn Shorrock had made his name in mid-'60s group the Twilights, a Beatles-sounding pop group who scored a national number one record with their version of the Velvelettes' "Needle in a Haystack." When that group broke up in 1969 Shorrock became lead singer of Axiom, whose "A Little Ray of Sunshine" is still an Australian classic rock staple. LRB's Beeb Birtles had been the bass player for a popular Twilights-era pop group called Zoot (Rick Springfield was a latter member). When that group broke up, in search of musical credibility, Birtles auditioned as the bass player, but was instantly elevated to a front-line position alongside Graham Goble. Even LRB's manager was well-known. Glenn Wheatley had been the bassist with another of Australia's bands, and possibly its most legendary, the Masters Apprentices. Given all that background, when Shorrock and Birtles revealed they were forming a group with Goble, managed by Wheatley, it was major event in Australian music. They had all had a shot at international stardom via England, without success. Little River Band was formed to conquer the world from Australia via America. With that in mind they almost immediately went into the studio, even before the rest of the band had been consolidated. They were retaining Mississippi drummer Derek Pellici and were on the lookout for a guitarist and a bass player. A very early version of the group recorded the Everly Brothers' "When Will I Be Loved" as a single, a recording that was shelved when Linda Ronstadt also happened to choose that song as a single. The blueprint for Little River Band was country-rock exponents like the Eagles. Their self-titled first album was released in November 1975. The following May they released a second album, After Hours, and in September of that year set off on their first trip overseas to support Queen at Hyde Park and the Average White Band in the U.S. to promote the release of the first album. Its eight-and-a-half minute epic "It's a Long Way There" had been edited down for release as a single and was starting to make quite an impact. Graham Goble had written the song about the long trip taking his laundry back to his mother in Adelaide from Melbourne. To an America in shock after the Nixon presidency the song took on a whole other dimension. LRB had made a big breakthrough. Their American record company decided that the second album After Hours was too dark, and put the band straight into the studio to record the next album, resolving to use some of the After Hours tracks and the best of what was being recorded for the band's third Australian album. In both forms the result was called Diamantina Cocktail, produced by John Boylan (Linda Ronstadt). To date LRB's success in Australia had been modestly in keeping with the band's place in Australian music history; respected but not totally embraced. The single from the new album, Glenn Shorrock's "Help Is on Its Way," changed that. Another important hit in America, in Australia it went all the way to number one. The album sold gold in America, the first time an Australian act had achieved such a feat. It was followed by Sleeper Catcher, again produced by Boylan, the first album recorded in Australia to sell over a million copies in the U.S. This time LRB's greater success was in America, with the single "Reminiscing" becoming a number three hit. This was the song John Lennon confessed he made love to during his "long weekend" separation from Yoko Ono. For the next four years LRB kept straddling the two continents, renowned for their impeccable live performances. Internally, relationships were not as happy. From the first album on, frontliners Shorrock, Birtles, and Goble recorded separately. On the road they traveled separately. Only on stage were they "together." Regular changes in the back line only contributed to the tensions. During one break between American tours, Graham Goble started writing and producing an album for Australian pop legend John Farnham. He then agitated the band to replace Glenn Shorrock with Farnham. Australia pricked up its ears, but America was in shock. This still-successful band was replacing the singer of all their big hits with an unknown! Farnham walked straight into the recording studio to record The Net. More lineup changes followed, including the departure of Beeb Birtles. In all, John Farnham recorded three albums with LRB over four years. The experiment never worked. Whatever Farnham's talents, America longed for Glenn Shorrock. At the end of 1985, while LRB was seriously contemplating its future, Farnham took the initiative of leaving to start work on another solo album, Whispering Jack, an album which completely rehabilitated Farnham as the biggest-selling artist in Australia. LRB regrouped in 1988 with new management and a new record label. Glenn Shorrock and Derek Pellicci rejoined Goble, with "new boys" Wayne Nelson and John Housden to record the Monsoon album and its single "Love Is a Bridge." In 1990, Goble left Little River Band as a touring member, and the band as we'd known it finally called it a day in 1991. And yet the story continues. For a while drummer Derek Pellicci mounted Little River Band tours with a lineup including Glenn Shorrock. When Glenn didn't want to meet one particular schedule due to other commitments, he was sacked, resulting in unpleasant legal action. Then Pellicci also gave it away, and today there's an LRB lineup living and working in America, still featuring those latecomers Wayne Nelson and Steve Housden. ~ Ed Nimmervoll, All Music Guide

Billy Ocean's Official Website

Billy Ocean was one of the first Caribbean singers to be embraced by MTV, resulting in a string of Top Ten hits during the mid-'80s. Born Leslie Charles in Trinidad on January 21, 1950, Ocean moved to England at the age of eight, and by his teenaged years, was singing regularly in London clubs. During this time, Ocean paid the bills by working at Ford Motors, but continued to pen songs and perform, as he issued an obscure debut single in 1974 under the name of Scorched Earth. But by 1975, the singer had dropped his alias and was going by Billy Ocean, resulting in a self-titled debut that spawned the singer's first hit single, "Love Really Hurts Without You," peaking on the singles chart at number two in the United Kingdom and number 22 in the United States. Ocean continued to issue albums (1980's City Limit, 1981's Nights (Feel Like Getting Down), and 1982's Inner Feelings) plus further singles, with "L.O.D. (Love on Delivery)" and the title track from Nights (the latter of which crossed over onto the U.S. R&B charts) being sizeable hits; as he also began penning songs for other artists, including a track on LaToya Jackson's 1980 self-titled debut. But breakthrough success was just around the corner for Ocean, as he scored a massive hit single in 1984 with "Caribbean Queen," a track that shot to the top of the charts worldwide. Depending on the region, the song's title and lyrics were changed slightly, resulting in the tune being known as "African Queen" and "European Queen" in other parts of the world, while the album it was taken from, Suddenly, was eventually certified double platinum (a few other singles, "Loverboy" and the ballad "Suddenly," were also successful). Ocean's winning streak continued with 1986's Love Zone (another double-platinum hit), which spawned a pair of hit singles: "When the Going Gets Tough, The Tough Get Going" (which was used as the theme song to the movie Jewel of the Nile), which peaked at number two, and the number-one "There'll Be Sad Songs (To Make You Cry)." 1988 saw Ocean score another number-one single with "Get Outta My Dreams, Get Into My Car," taken from the platinum album Tear Down These Walls. But afterward, the hits dried up for Ocean (although his 1989 collection, Greatest Hits, has been a steady seller over the years), as such further albums as Time to Move On, L.I.F.E., and Showdown failed to spawn hits. ~ Greg Prato, All Music Guide

The Last Goodnight's Official Website

It's difficult to pigeonhole the Last Goodnight as a band that fits into a specific genre unless it's one as broad as pop/rock, even if they do look like your typical emo group. Originally coming together while attending Enfield High in Connecticut, the band -- Kurtis John (vocals, piano), Mike Nadeau (lead guitar), Anton Yurack (guitar, keys, vocals), Leif Christensen (bass), and Larone McMillan (drums) -- started concocting traditionally structured songs that could have easily come out of the catalogs of Elton John and Supertramp. After they graduated and went off to college in 2003, they independently pressed two releases under the moniker Renata and started receiving airplay. In typical band fashion, they bought a van and embarked on short tours on nights and weekends, eventually earning opening slots for Lifehouse and Avril Lavigne. After a name change, a gig at the famous Whisky A Go Go in L.A. caught the attention of producer Jeff Blue, who took them into the studio to start recording and fine-tuning their sound. In 2007, Virgin signed the Last Goodnight and released their debut, Poison Kiss, in August of that year. ~ Jason Lymangrover, All Music Guide

Jeremy Lesley's Official Website

Jeremy Lesley has been performing and writing music since he was 4 1/2 years old. By the time he was 10 years old, he had recorded his 2nd album on a Nashville label and was touring over 250 dates per year. His soulful, bluesy voice is one of conviction and power. He sings a wide range of music, which includes country, rock, blues and gospel. His songs tell the stories of life, pain, heartbreak, joy, and love. Jeremy plays keyboards, guitars, and Native American flutes and drums.

Most recently, Jeremy became the winner of the 2007 Georgia State Colgate Country Showdown. This is the same competition, which was won by Toby Keith just a few years ago. The Showdown is a nationally recognized competition, which has introduced us to the talents of Garth Brooks, Martina McBride, Sara Evans, Neil McCoy, and many more country superstars.

An army of world-class musicians flanks Jeremy. Randy Beason (guitars/banjo/mandolin/dobro), Billy McKeithen (bass), Bart Hanner (guitars/vocals), Siave Teofillo (drums), and Amanda Self (vocals) have all rocked around the world with virtually ever style of music known to man. Together, this band will rock your world with the best mix of country, blues, and rock and roll cover tunes and original music destined for the charts!