Albums : Brad Paisley : Wheelhouse

Albums : Brad Paisley : Wheelhouse

Listen To Brad Paisley : Wheelhouse

Who Is Brad Paisley?
Contemporary country singer/songwriter Brad Paisley was born October 28, 1972, in Glen Dale, West Virginia; given his first guitar at age eight, he delivered his first public performance at church two years later. With his fifty-something guitar teacher Clarence "Hank" Goddard and two of the older man's seasoned musician buddies, the teenaged Paisley formed his first band, the C-Notes, and at age 12 began writing his own material. After performing in front of the local Rotary Club, he was invited to appear on Wheeling station WWVA's famed Saturday night broadcast Jamboree USA. Paisley's debut was so well received that he was invited to join the program full-time, and in the years to follow he opened for the likes of the Judds, Roy Clark, and Little Jimmy Dickens. He later attended Nashville's Belmont University, serving an internship with ASCAP; the contacts Paisley made there helped him land a songwriting deal with EMI, and he also appeared on countless demos.

Signing to Arista, he issued his debut solo album, Who Needs Pictures, in 1999. The record produced two chart-topping singles in "He Didn't Have to Be," an ode to loving stepfathers, and "We Danced," and also earned generally positive reviews for its diversity of country styles. In the meantime, Paisley recorded a duet with Chely Wright, "Hard to Be a Husband, Hard to Be a Wife," for the Backstage at the Grand Ole Opry compilation; the two later collaborated on several songs for Wright's Never Love You Enough album. The sequel to Paisley's debut, Part II, was released in 2001 and promptly returned him to the Top Five with "Two People Fell in Love." "I'm Gonna Miss Her (The Fishin' Song)" gave Paisley his third chart-topper, and "Wrapped Around" fell one spot short of becoming his fourth. "I Wish You'd Stay" became the fourth Top Ten hit from the record in early 2003.

At the beginning of August 2005, Paisley put together a short "director's commentary" preview of his next album for his fan base to download. The full album, Time Well Wasted, appeared two weeks later and narrowly missed the top of the album charts, though it did hit number one on the country charts. In 2006 Brad Paisley Christmas, a collection of both originals and covers, came out, followed by 5th Gear in 2007, which included the ubiquitous "Ticks," a sure future novelty classic. An album of mostly guitar instrumentals (Paisley's excellent guitar playing is a big part of his appeal), Play, followed in 2008, with the big country vocal hit "Waitin' on a Woman" added in as a "bonus" track. By now poised at the very top of the commercial country world, Paisley released American Saturday Night in 2009. American Saturday Night was greeted by his strongest reviews yet and generated the hit singles "Then," "Welcome to the Future," and "Water." Paisley bought some time with the 2010 release Hits Alive — a double-disc package divided into one live set and one collection of hits — and then returned with his seventh collection of new songs, This Is Country Music, in May 2011.

"Old Alabama," the second single pulled from This Is Country Music, became Paisley's 19th number one single, followed quickly by his 20th number one, the Carrie Underwood duet "Remind Me." As he toured the album, Paisley also busied himself in a variety of show biz cameos, including popping up on the Cars 2 soundtrack and guesting on South Park. After the tour came to a conclusion, he set out to work on his ninth album, Wheelhouse. An ambitious, genre-hopping album, the record was preceded by the "Southern Comfort Zone" single in the fall of 2012 and "Beat This Summer," which appeared a month prior to Wheelhouse's April 2013 release. ~ Steve Huey & Steve Leggett, Rovi

Wheelehouse Review
Shakespeare put many of his most trenchant observations about the human condition into the mouths of comic characters — jesters and fools — knowing that wisdom is disseminated more effectively with a spoonful of humor. Country music triple threat Brad Paisley ratchets up his Bard-like savvy on "Wheelhouse," perhaps his most ambitious album to date, taking on such hot-button topics as spousal abuse, Southern provincialism, racism and social justice alongside characteristically well-crafted mainstream country fare.

Paisley's vantage points are framed through his still-blossoming stardom, which has taken him far beyond his album's title. "Southern Comfort Zone" sets the tone right away, as Paisley sings over a throbbing country-rock beat: "I have walked the streets of Rome/I have been to foreign lands/I know what it's like to talk/And have nobody understand."

Paisley's master stroke is to mine empathy — not frustration — from that experience, still embracing his core values while quietly extending others the same courtesy. And he packages it all in an arena-ready singalong, tacitly inviting listeners to sample his perspective.

"Karate" is a more lighthearted counterpart to Martina McBride's 1994 hit "Independence Day," in which an abused woman literally gains the upper hand, while "Accidental Racist" even-handedly questions assumptions about race relations, with middle America's favorite rapper, LL Cool J, along to help flesh out his message. "Those Crazy Christians" deftly tweaks and salutes the faithful among whom Paisley grew up.

A ballad of lost love, "Tin Can on a String," and the end-of-week party anthem "Outstanding in Our Field" sound pedestrian by comparison to the album's high points. But then, even Shakespeare was known to throw his core following a few bones along the way if it helped get his intention across.


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