ZAC BROWN BAND FACTS
Genre: Country, Pop
Hometown: Dahlonega, Georgia
Albums: Far from Einstyne (2004), Home Grown (2005), The Foundation (2008), You Get What You Give (2010) and Uncaged (2012).
Awards: 2 Grammy Awards, 2 CMT Music Awards, 2 Academy of Country Music Awards, 2 Country Music Association Awards.
Hits: "Knee Deep," "No Hurry," "The Wind," "She's Walking Away," "Free," "Keep Me In Mind," "Whatever It Is" and "Chicken Fried."
Other: Zac Brown is the 11th child in a family of 12 children, and used his family's wide range of musical influences to inform his own musical development.
As one of the most prominent voices in the country genre and American music as a whole, Zac Brown Band has forged its own unique sounds and drawn upon myriad influences to appeal to a wide range of musical tastes. Brown grew up in Dahlonega, Georgia, and began taking classical guitar lessons at age 7, before he moved onto bluegrass and country. During his teens, he played country and pop covers at local coffeehouses, as well as some of his own material before going to college on a vocal scholarship.
In the early 2000s, Zac Brown toured as a two-piece acoustic group dubbed Far From Einstyne, and Zac Brown Band came together in 2002 under Brown's own label, Southern Ground. In 2003, Zac Brown Band released their first album, Home Grown, and followed that with a live album, Live From The Rock Bus Tour, in 2005. Both albums went on to sell more than 30,000 units, an impressive figure considering the group was releasing music under their own label and relying on word-of-mouth and online promotion to reach new listeners.
After years of extensive touring and promotion, Zac Brown Band finally had their first major hit in 2008 with the release of their album, The Foundation. The band's single, "Chicken Fried," became a multi-platinum sensation on both country and pop music charts, and broke into Billboard's Hot 100 Songs chart. Because of the runaway success of the album, Zac Brown Band won the Grammy Award for Best New Artist in 2010 and got a major boost in sales for the group's next album, You Get What You Give.
Fresh off the success of 2012's album, Uncaged, Zac Brown Band has returned to the studio and plans to release a new record as well as their first acoustic album sometime during 2013. With an ever-expanding legion of fans from all corners of the music industry, Zac Brown Band has created their own unique sound and drawn upon countless musical influences to become one of the most dynamic groups on the scene today.