GARY BENNETT
Gary
Bennett co-fronted and was a founding member of the critically acclaimed country
music band BR549, who recorded five well-received albums (four with Arista and
one with Sony), received three Grammy nominations and was hailed by music industry
trade magazine Billboard as having single-handedly revived the soul of country
music in Nashville. During Gary's tenure, the band sold over 500,000 albums and
toured the world, headlining shows as well as opening for such artists as Bob
Dylan, George Jones, Merle Haggard, the Black Crowes and Brian Setzer. BR549 was
also voted "Best Country Group" in 1996 by Rolling Stone magazine.
Bennett
was born October 9, 1964 in Las Vegas, Nevada to country music loving parents.
After living in Conroe, Texas for the first 5 years of his life, and a year more
in southern California, the family settled in
the small Northwest-logging
town of Cougar, Washington, which is nestled at the foot of Mt. St. Helens. By
age 16, Gary was playing bass for a gospel band and began to get a taste of the
musician's life on the road.
After high school and a series of logging jobs,
Bennett began performing as a solo act in hometown bars every weekend, playing
the traditional country songs he had learned as a boy from his parent's record
collection, along with a growing repertoire of original songs.
In
1993, he loaded his pickup truck and headed for Nashville. Unfortunately, he arrived
at a time when "real country music" had been all but forgotten.
After
attending many fruitless songwriter nights, Gary began hanging out in the honky-tonks
of the historic "Lower Broadway" area of downtown Nashville. "I
felt that though it was a destitute scene, it was also
wide open for something
to happen there," he reminisced. Within a month, Bennett took a solo gig
at a bar there. Eventually, he fronted a band at Roberts' Western World, a boot
store by day, honky-tonk by night. It was about this time that he met singer-songwriter
Chuck Mead, and the duo quickly realized they had similar interests and styles.
The chemistry was perfect for an updated approach to traditional country music.
The
two formed the group, which after various personnel changes, became BR549. Less
than six months after arriving in Nashville, they were on their way to becoming
the darlings of Music City. BR549 graced
the cover of Billboard magazine before
they even had a record deal. Shortly thereafter, the band was
hounded by every
major record label in town, eventually signing with Arista Records.
After
five major album releases and years of constant world wide touring, Gary felt
as though the musical freedom BR549 once enjoyed had become stagnant due to the
"retro" pin tagged to them. Wanting to make original & more progressive
music, Bennett made a decision in to step away from the group and let his head
clear. Gary Bennett left BR549 in 2002 and retreated from music for a short while,
only to return to writing and performing in 2006 with the release of his first solo record "Human Condition".
Human
Condition was praised by critics and fans all over the world. After a string of short concert tours and the release of a DVD, "Inside and Out", Bennett took a break to focus heavily on songwriting. From that much needed break came the itch to record again.
On July 13th 2010 Bennett releases his first EP, "You Are Never Nice To Me", featuring two songs from his upcoming full length album (due in the Fall of 2010) and two bonus tracks.
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