Troyal Garth Brooks (born February 7, 1962), best known as Garth Brooks , is an American country music artist. His eponymous first album was released in 1989 and peaked at #2 in the US country album chart while climbing to #13 on the Billboard 200 pop album chart. Brooks's integration of rock elements into his recordings and live performances has earned him immense popularity. This progressive approach allowed him to dominate the country single and album charts while quickly crossing over into the mainstream pop arena, exposing country music to a larger audience.
Brooks has enjoyed one of the most successful careers in popular music history, breaking records for both sales and concert attendance throughout the 1990s. Garth Brooks still continues to sell well and according to Nielsen Soundscan, his album sales up to 68,363,000 (until the end of 2009), which makes him the best-selling albums artist in the United States in the SoundScan era (1991-to date), a title held since 1991, well over 7 million ahead of his nearest rival, The Beatles. Furthemore, according to RIAA he is the best-selling solo albums artist in the United States of all time (overall is second to the Beatles) with 128 million units sold. Brooks has released six albums that achieved diamond status in the United States, those being: Garth Brooks (10× platinum), No Fences (17× platinum), Ropin' the Wind (14× platinum), The Hits (10× platinum), Sevens (10× platinum) and Double Live (21× platinum). Since 1989, Brooks has released 19 records in all, which include; 9 studio albums, 1 live album, 4 compilation albums, 3 Christmas albums and 2 box sets, along with 77 singles. Brooks is estimated to have topped 220 million units in sales of singles and albums worldwide.
Troubled by conflicts between career and family, Brooks officially retired from recording and performing from 2001 until 2009. During this time he sold millions of albums through an exclusive distribution deal with Wal-Mart and has sporadically released new singles. In 2005, Brooks started a partial comeback, and has since given several performances and released two compilation albums.
On October 15, 2009, Garth Brooks announced the end of his retirement. In December 2009, he began a 5 year concert deal with the Encore Hotel and Casino on the Las Vegas Strip. He continues to deny any plans to tour or record new music for another 5 years.
Early life
Garth Brooks was born on February 7, 1962 in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He was the youngest child of Troyal Raymond Brooks, a draftsman for an oil company, and Colleen Carroll, a 1950s-era country singer who recorded on the Capitol Records label and appeared on Ozark Jubilee . This was the second marriage for each of his parents, giving Garth four older half-siblings (Jim, Jerry, Mike, and Betsy). The couple had two children together, Kelly and Garth. At their home in Yukon, Oklahoma, the family hosted weekly talent nights. All of the children were required to participate, either by singing or doing skits. Brooks learned to play both the guitar and banjo.
As a child, he often sang in casual family settings but his primary focus was athletics. In high school, he played football and baseball and ran track. He received a track scholarship to Oklahoma State University in Stillwater, where he competed in the javelin. Brooks graduated in 1984 with a degree in advertising.
Later that year, Brooks began his professional music career, singing and playing guitar in Oklahoma clubs and bars, particularly the Tumbleweed in Stillwater. Through his elder siblings, Brooks was exposed to a wide range of music. Although he listened to some country music, especially that of George Jones, Brooks was most fond of rock music, citing James Taylor, Dan Fogelberg, and Townes Van Zandt as major influences. After hearing Unwound , George Strait's debut single, in 1981, Brooks decided that he was more interested in playing country music.
In 1985, noted entertainment attorney Rod Phelps drove from Dallas to listen to Brooks. Phelps liked what he heard and offered to produce Garth's first demo. With Phelps's encouragement, Brooks traveled to Nashville to pursue a recording contract; he returned to Oklahoma within 24 hours. In 1986, Brooks married Sandy Mahl, whom he had met while working as a bouncer. In 1987, the couple moved to Nashville, and Brooks began making contacts in the music industry. The couple later had three daughters: Taylor Mayne Pearl (born 1992), August Anna (born 1994) and Allie Colleen (born 1996).
Music career
1989 – 1990: Breakthrough success
Garth Brooks's eponymous first album, was released in 1989 and was a critical and chart success. It peaked at #2 in the US country album chart and reached #13 on the Billboard 200 pop album chart. Most of the album was traditionalist country, influenced in part by George Strait. The first single, "Much Too Young (To Feel This Damn Old)," was a country top 10 success. It was followed by his first country #1, "If Tomorrow Never Comes." "Not Counting You" reached #2, and then "The Dance" put him at #1 again; this song's theme of people dying while doing something they believe in resonated strongly and, together with a popular music video, gave Brooks his first push towards a broader audience. Brooks has claimed that of all the songs he has recorded, "The Dance" is his favorite.
His follow-up album, No Fences , was released in 1990 and spent 23 weeks as #1 on the Billboard country music chart. The album also reached #3 on the pop chart, and eventually became Brooks's highest-selling album, with domestic shipments of 17 million. It contained what would become Brooks's signature song, the blue collar anthem "Friends in Low Places", as well as two other Brooks classics, the dramatic and controversial "The Thunder Rolls" and the philosophically ironic "Unanswered Prayers". Each of these songs, as well as the affectionate "Two of a Kind, Workin' on a Full House," reached #1 on the country chart. While Brooks's musical style placed him squarely within the boundaries of country music, he was strongly influenced by the 1970s singer-songwriter movement, especially the works of James Taylor (whom he idolized and named his first child after) and Dan Fogelberg. Similarly, Brooks was influenced by the operatic rock of the 1970s-era Freddie Mercury, Billy Joel, and Bruce Springsteen. In his highly successful live shows, Brooks used a wireless headset microphone to free himself to run about the stage, adding energy and arena rock theatrics to spice up the normally staid country music approach to concerts. The hard rock band Kiss was also one of his earliest grade school musical influences and his shows often reflected this. Brooks said that the style of his show was inspired mostly by Chris LeDoux.
1991 – 1993: Ropin' the Wind and The Chase
Brooks's third album, Ropin' the Wind , released in September 1991, had advance orders of 4 million copies and entered the pop album charts at #1, a first for a country act. Ropin' the Wind' s music was a melange of pop country and honky tonk; hits included Billy Joel's "Shameless", "What She's Doing Now", and "The River". All told, it became his second-best selling album after No Fences . The success of this album further propelled the sales of his first two albums, enabling Brooks to become the first country artist with three albums listed in the pop top 20 in one week.
After spending time in Los Angeles during the 1992 riots, Brooks co-wrote the gospel-country-rock hybrid "We Shall Be Free" to express his desire for tolerance. The song became the first single off his fourth album The Chase . It only reached #12 on the country chart, his first song in three years to fail to make the top ten. Nevertheless, the song often received standing ovations when performed in concert, went to #22 in the Christian charts through a marketing deal with Rick Hendrix Company, and earned Brooks a 1993 GLAAD Media Award.
1993 – 1994: In Pieces
In 1993, Garth Brooks, who had criticized music stores which sold used CDs since it led to a loss in royalty payments, persuaded Capitol Records not to ship his August 1993 album In Pieces to stores which engaged in this practice. This led to several anti-trust lawsuits against the record label and ended with Capitol shipping the CDs to the stores after all.
Despite the delay in shipping the album to certain stores, In Pieces was another instant No. 1 success, selling a total of about 10 million copies worldwide. Some of his fans were upset, however, that the album was not released simultaneously around the world. In the United Kingdom, one of Brooks's most committed fan bases outside the United States, country music disc jockeys, such as Martin Campbell and John Wellington, noted that many fans were buying the album on import. This made it the first album to debut in the top 10 of the UK Country album charts before its official release date. Once officially released there, in 1994, the album reached the top spot on the UK Country chart and number two on the UK pop albums chart. That same year "The Red Strokes" became Brooks's first single to make the pop top 40 in the UK, reaching a high of No. 13; it was followed by "Standing Outside The Fire", which reached No. 23. Previous albums No Fences , Ropin' The Wind and The Chase also remained in the top 30 in the UK.
To support the album, Brooks embarked on a 1994 UK tour, selling out venues such as Birmingham's National Exhibition C
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