"Billy Currington" News / Via The Beardscratchers Compendium

Billy Currington Loses Nascar Gig After Arrest

Sun, 28 Apr 2013 14:14:14 +0100

Country star Billy Currington has lost a singing gig at an upcoming Nascar race after he was indicted on felony charges stemming from an alleged...

Billy Currington Indicted Over Threat Allegations

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 01:30:17 +0100

Country singer Billy Currington has been indicted on charges of threatening an elderly man in Georgia earlier this month (Apr13).The People Are Crazy...

Billy Currington runs through life at own speed

Mon, 11 Oct 2010 17:00:14 +0100

Billy Currington has a no-rush policy. He doesn't have to say it or put it in a contract: It's written in his DNA.

Billy Currington: Enjoy Yourself (Reviews)

Wed, 06 Oct 2010 07:00:13 +0100

Zac Brown Band Top Billboard, With Maroon 5 Close Behind

Wed, 29 Sep 2010 17:32:26 +0100

Selena Gomez and the Scene debut at #4.
By Gil Kaufman

Maroon 5
Photo: Jack Jeffries/ MTV

It was a short trip to the top for Linkin Park. A week after the band's A Thousand Suns hit #1 on the Billboard 200, sales dropped off by more than 70 percent as a pair of newcomers took the lead. Snagging the pole position is last year's Best New Artist Grammy winner Zac Brown Band, whose You Get What You Give will take #1 on sales of 153,000, according to figures provided by Nielsen SoundScan. Just behind at #2 is the chart debut of Maroon 5's third album, Hands All Over, which moved 142,000 units.

They're joined by a number of other top 10 debuts, including a #4 bow by Selena Gomez and the Scene with A Year Without Rain (66,000), rock legend Santana with his covers album Guitar Heaven: The Greatest Guitar Classics of All Time (#5, 66,000), John Legend and the Roots' collaborative covers effort Wake Up! (#8, 63,000) and country singer Billy Currington's Enjoy Yourself (#9, 45,000).

The rest of the top 10: Linkin Park (#3, 70,000), Eminem, Recovery (#6, 66,000), Trey Songz, Passion, Pain & Pleasure (#7, 66,000, down 73 percent) and Justin Bieber, My World 2.0 (#10, 33,000). The continued strong sales for Eminem helped the rapper claim the title for the best-selling album released in 2010, as Recovery will surpass Lady Antebellum's Need You Now by crossing the 2.6 million mark.

Otherwise it was a quiet week, as some albums that debuted in the top 10 last week saw serious drops, including country outlaw Jamey Johnson's Guitar Song (down 52 percent to 30,000), Led Zeppelin singer Robert Plant's Band of Joy (down 48 percent to 25,000) and Weezer, whose indie-label debut, Hurley, tumbles 18 spots to #24 as sales tailed off by 69 percent to 14,000.

Positive-vibes merchants Michael Franti & Spearhead have a strong debut with The Sound of Sunshine (#17, 18,000), while System of a Down singer Serj Tankian lands at #35 with Imperfect Harmonies (10,000). Maroon 5 have bragging rights on the iTunes albums chart, where Hands takes the #1 spot, followed by Zac Brown, Legend and the Roots, Linkin Park, Santana, Eminem, the resilient Sigh No More by Mumford & Sons, Songz, Gomez and Spearhead.

Though sales figures are not released, Bruno Mars should be smiling that he's holding onto the top slot on the iTunes singles chart with his breakout solo hit, "Just the Way You Are." Just behind are Far East Movement with "Like a G6," Rihanna with "Only Girl (In the World)," Nelly's "Just a Dream," Katy Perry's "Teenage Dream," Usher's "DJ Got Us Fallin' in Love" and Taio Cruz with "Dynamite." Rounding out the singles chart is Flo Rida's "Club Can't Handle Me" and two new entries from the "Glee" cast, "Empire State of Mind" and "Telephone."

There will be more shuffling at the top next week with the debut of new albums from Gucci Mane, Kenny Chesney, Jeremih and Eric Clapton.

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In Stock?: New CDs From Flying Lotus, Hillary Hahn And Billy Currington

Tue, 21 Sep 2010 22:22:00 +0100

On "New Music Tuesday" we check in with a record store to see what's in stock and what's selling.

Review: Currington finds right groove on new CD

Tue, 21 Sep 2010 13:00:22 +0100

Billy Currington, "Enjoy Yourself" (Mercury Nashville) Billy Currington flashes a big musical smile throughout his fourth album, "Enjoy Yourself." Concentrating on breezy songs that slip from sweet romance to pleasurable toasts, the album sounds as if it should come with an ocean breeze and something cold to sip.

Billy Currington - Arts - Country music - Beer - Singing

Lady Antebellum, Miranda Lambert Win Big At Academy Of Country Music Awards

Mon, 19 Apr 2010 17:54:00 +0100

Taylor Swift gets shut out at the 2010 ACMs in Las Vegas.
By Gil Kaufman

Miranda Lambert takes home the award for "Album of the Year" at the 2010 ACM awards
Photo: Rick Diamond/ Getty Images

LAS VEGAS — It was poised to be a big night for the ladies at the 45th annual Academy of Country Music Awards on Sunday night from the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. And Miranda Lambert, Carrie Underwood and Lady Antebellum made sure that prediction came true as the pistol-packing country gal, the former "American Idol" champ and the female-led chart-topping trio swept up the evening's major awards.

Host Reba McEntire opened the show with some sharp-tongued barbs, praising the year of hits that included "White Liar," and then thanked Tiger Woods and Jesse James for giving country's women so much material. She took some good-humored jabs at young stars Underwood and Taylor Swift, joking about Underwood's recent engagement and Swift's runaway success. "At least I can vote," she said, looking at Swift with a grin.

Before the accolades started rolling in, the show kicked off with Lambert and Underwood dueting on Creedence Clearwater Revival's 1970 hit "Travelin' Band," giving the already swampy rock hit a Nashville rock makeover. The tune's composer, CCR genius John Fogerty, came out and ripped off a wicked solo and threw down a verse, trading off guitar licks with country star Brad Paisley. Also joining them was fiddle icon Charlie Daniels, who recently recovered from a minor stroke.

The big night then began for Lady Antebellum, as the group won Song of the Year for their country pop breakthrough "Need You Now," which beat out tunes by Underwood, Swift and Lambert. "Thank God, thank our families, thank the fans so much," said singer Hillary Scott. Shortly after, the group — who led all nominees with seven — won Single Record of the Year for the same tune. They earned two trophies for the Single and Song wins because they produced and wrote "Need You Now," as well as one for top Vocal Group, for a total of five.

The group went acoustic later in the show for their performance of the ballad "American Honey," which included a shout-out "Thank you, fans!" mid-song.

"When we wrote 'Need You Now,' I don't think we knew what we had on our hands," said group member Charles Kelley afterwards about the song that almost didn't make the album. "You never know where a song can take you, and tonight is probably the pinnacle of our career."

Swift, introduced by her pal LL Cool J, rocked the house with the Tri-Tones, a 16-member San Diego choir she found on YouTube, who joined her for a rousing rendition of "Change." Uncharacteristically dressed down in black denim leggings, black boots and a black tank top, she started the tune by flying out over the crowd in a round cage wearing a white dress and changed costumes midair, flinging her hair around wildly and then capping the set off by diving into a group of guys, who then carried her away on her back. Despite five nominations, however, the singer went home empty-handed on Sunday night.

"Legally Blonde — The Musical" Broadway star Laura Bell Bundy made a sexy run through her single "Giddy On Up," in which she did some sassy line dancing while wearing a cropped top and chaps over supertight jeans.

Underwood took the stage again later in the show in a flowing floral gown for a moving performance of "Temporary Home," backed by a female quartet on piano, violin, acoustic guitar and cello. Tearing up while accepting the Triple Crown Award — joining an elite group of artists in 2009 who've won Top New Female/Male Vocalist, Top Female/Male Vocalist and Entertainer of the Year from the ACM — Underwood thanked her fans and said, "I could never have wished for, asked for, dreamt of anything like this."

She had more thanks to give near show's end, when she made history by becoming the only female to win the fan-voted Entertainer of the Year honor twice and in consecutive years in the award's 40-year history. "My phone is buzzing!" she said as she took the stage to accept the award. "Thank you, fans. I love you so much. Thank you, country music," she added jumping up and down and twirling around in celebration.

Lambert got in on the action in a big way as well, winning for Video of the Year for "White Liar" as well as snagging the night's big honor for Album of the Year for her third album, Revolution, and Female Vocalist of the Year, which earned her a big hug from Underwood. "This music is what I do, it's the only thing I live for. Thanks for loving it. It changed my life," she said after winning Album of the Year, the second time she's taken that trophy. The rabble-rouser toned it down later for her performance of the hushed ballad "The House That Built Me," a slice of humble pie about remembering and honoring your roots.

Speaking to the press afterwards, Lambert said her reaction to Female Vocalist of the Year was, "Are you freaking kidding me. I'm completely shocked."

The guys weren't entirely frozen out, as the performance-packed show also featured songs from Billy Currington, Blake Shelton with Trace Adkins, Tim McGraw, Jack Ingram with Dierks Bentley, Kenny Chesney, Jason Aldean, Rascal Flatts, Toby Keith with jazz great Dave Koz in a tribute to late NBA great and jazz player Wayman Tisdale, and a taped spot from the Zac Brown Band playing for troops in the Persian Gulf.

Before announcing the top Male Vocalist award, presenter Matthew McConaughey let slip that he and wife Camila Alves conceived their second child after last year's show. The winner, Brad Paisley, was still soaking wet after jumping into a pool at the end of his performance just moments before.

After their final-ever ACM performance, soon-to-retire duo Brooks & Dunn won an amazing 16th Top Vocal Duo award for "Honky Tonk Stomp."

Luke Bryan won Top New Solo Vocalist and Top New Artist, Joey & Rory took Top New Vocal Duo, Gloriana snagged Top New Vocal Group, and Blake Shelton and Trace Adkins were awarded Vocal Event of the Year for "Hillbilly Bone."

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The Avett Brothers: I and Love and You

Thu, 25 Mar 2010 15:30:00 +0000

As a nation, we haven't warmed much to country and western – but are the Avett Brothers the ones to change all that, asks Alexis Petridis

You never feel more British than when perusing the Billboard Country Chart. It's packed with people you've never heard of, all selling millions while apparently locked in a tooth-and-nail struggle to come up with the least persuasive album title of all time. The current undisputed bad-title champion – though he faces stiff competition from Billy Currington (Little Bit of Everything) and Brooks and Dunn (Number Ones … and Then Some) – seems to be a bloke called Luke Bryan, who released a debut called I'll Stay Me, thus reassuring fans who feared he was planning to undergo intimate surgery and re-emerge as a disco singer called Lucinda Brysexual. He followed it up with an album called Doin' My Thing and in between had a hit with his single We Rode in Trucks, which seems a bit like releasing a single called We Went to Homebase, or We Ate Some Crisps.

Elsewhere, there's Danny Gokey, Lady Antebellum, Gary Allan, the Zac Brown Band, Colt Ford, Kellie Pickler. In America, these names are a veritable Who's Who: in Britain, they're more of a Who's That? Your sense of puzzlement is bolstered by the kind of things these mysterious names get up to. A band called Sugarland struck big with a baffling looky-here-y'all cover of the Dream Academy's none-more-English 80s hit Life in a Northern Town. Whatever next? Perhaps Rascal Flatts might yet wow the good ol' boys with a version of Billy Bragg's From a Vauxhall Velox.

It's all testament to the UK's enduring resistance to country and western. We will pay due homage to the historical greats: Hank Williams, Patsy Cline, Johnny Cash, Gram Parsons. There are certainly takers for that brand of country rock known as Americana, albeit largely middle-aged men who seem to have decided life doesn't have much left to offer them and are now intent on slowly boring themselves to death with their own record collections. But there's virtually no British audience for mainstream country music.

That may be about to change as a result of I and Love and You, the major label debut by North Carolina's Avett Brothers. Admittedly, they're not a product of the Nashville establishment – they released a string of albums on tiny independent labels before being taken under the hairy wing of producer Rick Rubin – and their sound is less glossy than that of the Stetson massive, with whom you suspect the Avett Brothers would take umbrage at being compared. Nevertheless, it's no less fixated on mainstream success. It makes no bones about its desire to fill stadiums and sell in quantities that would give Luke Bryan momentary pause from doin' his thing. "They said, 'Don't take your business to the big time' – I bought us tickets there," they sing on Slight Figure of Speech, to a backing that sets up camp somewhere between Americana and the Billboard Country Chart. Back home at least, their dreams appear to be coming true: they were picked as one of Rolling Stone's Bands to Watch in 2010, and I and Love and You crashed into the US top 20.

Ironically, Slight Figure of Speech is one of the few tracks from which you get a sense of the frantic, punky energy that apparently fuelled their earlier albums: it barrels along, driven by a kind of pre-pot Beatles raucousness. But I and Love and You's stock in trade is a slowly building acoustic ballad of quite startling earnestness and sincerity. By contrast, Snow Patrol are masters of the ironically cocked eyebrow and the knowing wink. "I want to have friends who love me for the man I become, not the man I was," offers The Perfect Space. The Avett Brothers keep saying things like that, which means the album's strengths – powerful melodies, exquisite fraternal harmonies, Rubin's tasteful production – tend to be drowned out by the fear that, at any minute, they might tell you there's no I in team.

The British public may well embrace this Kentucky Fried Coldplay routine with a warmth they deny Lady Antebellum and the Zac Brown Band: it certainly seems less alien than Sugarland yee-hawing their way through the Dream Academy's back catalogue. But if you feel that the world doesn't really need any more earnest, slowly building ballads at this particular juncture in history, you might find the album most appealing when it occasionally tries something else: the relatively upbeat Tin Man – which features a tuba – or Kick Drum Heart's hoarse vocals and pounding piano. The finest moment may be when Laundry Room unexpectedly abandons the blueprint after three and half minutes and explodes into a thrilling bluegrass coda. At that moment, I and Love and You sounds like a band suddenly doing what they want to, rather than what they think they should.

Rating: 3/5

Alexis Petridis

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McGraw, Jackson added to CMA Music Festival lineup

Thu, 04 Mar 2010 15:22:00 +0000

Tim McGraw is coming back to the CMA Music Fest. McGraw returns after a nine-year absence and joins Alan Jackson, Billy Currington and Kellie Pickler as new additions to this summer's lineup for the annual festival in Nashville.

Ken Tucker's Top 10 Recordings Of 2009

Thu, 24 Dec 2009 16:30:00 +0000

Fresh Air's music critic Ken Tucker's picks for the best music of 2009 include songs by Taylor Swift, Billy Currington and Michael Franti as well as albums by Loudon Wainwright III, the Fiery Furnaces, and Bob Dylan.