RaeLynn

An alumna of the second season of TV singing competition The Voice, spirited country-pop singer RaeLynn had her first country Top 40 hit in 2012 with “Boyfriend.” Two years later, she reached the Top Ten of the Hot Country Songs chart with “God Made Girls.” Her debut album, 2017′s WildHorse, went all the way to number one on the country albums chart while hitting the Top 20 of the Billboard 200. Her sophomore effort, Baytown, arrived in 2021.
Baytown, Texas native Racheal Lynn Woodward was born in 1994 into a musical family (her brother Jake is a member of the Grammy-nominated band Leeland). She started out singing in church but discovered country music when she was 11 years old. With ambitions of a career in music by her mid-teens, she finished high school early and auditioned for the second season of The Voice in 2012. Already using mononym RaeLynn, she ended up on Blake Shelton’s team, and her versions of songs by Tom Petty, Maroon 5, and the Pistol Annies took her as far as the quarterfinals. The exposure did her well, and she signed a publishing deal with Dr. Luke’s Prescription Songs and a recording deal with Republic Nashville.
A single, “Boyfriend,” was released that same year, and it climbed to number 32 on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart. The follow-up, “God Made Girls,” arrived in mid-2014, this time reaching as high as number seven on the country chart. Both songs later appeared on her Me EP, which was issued by the Big Machine Label Group’s Valory Music Co. in early 2015. The EP hit the country Top Ten, peaking at number 49 on the Billboard 200. With her debut album already recorded, RaeLynn split with Valory the next year and signed with Warner’s Nashville arm.
Following tour dates with Blake Shelton, Warner issued RaeLynn’s full-length debut, WildHorse, in March 2017. It not only topped the country albums chart but reached number 20 on the Billboard 200. Following a diversion into slicker pop with the stand-alone song “Festival” in early 2018, RaeLynn returned to the country Top 40 with the single “Queens Don’t” in March. That September, Valory released the compilation Origins.
RaeLynn headed to Europe for tour dates in support of Maren Morris in mid-2019 and moved to Round Here Records, a label founded by Florida Georgia Line’s Tyler Hubbard and Brian Kelley. Her debut for the label, “Bra Off,” followed in late 2019, with “Keep Up” arriving in 2020. Both tracks appeared on her 2021 studio album Baytown. ~ Marcy Donelson & Steve Leggett