Trace Adkins

Trace Adkins helped keep country’s traditionalist flame burning during the crossover-happy late ’90s, mixing classic honky tonk with elements of gospel, blues, and rock & roll. Adkins had a knack for songs about the home truths of life and love in working class America like “You’re Gonna Miss This” and “Every Light in the House,” but he also knew how to get the party started with numbers like “Ladies Love Country Boys” and “Honky Tonk Badonkadonk.” And his deep, rich voice was powerfully expressive regardless of the themes. Adkins’ debut album, 1996′s Dreamin' Out Loud, showed his talent emerged fully formed, 2003′s Comin' On Strong was a set of songs that balanced maturity with good times, and 2017′s Something's Going On showed that after 20 years, his voice and his formula were still serving him well.
Trace Adkins was born in the small Louisiana town of Sarepta on January 13, 1962, and he took up the guitar when he was ten years old. When he was in high school, he began performing with a gospel quartet, New Commitment, who released a pair of albums for a small label. After graduating, he attended Louisiana Tech on a football scholarship, where he studied petroleum technology. However, in his freshman year, he suffered a severe injury to his knee and had to quit the team. Adkins dropped out before he could graduate, and spent over a decade working on oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico, while playing in a country band called Bayou in his spare time. During an accident at work, his pinky finger was severed, and at his request the doctors re-attached it at an angle so he could still play guitar. After several years of playing honky-tonks in the Texas-Louisiana-Arkansas triangle, he set out to try his luck in Nashville, moving to Music City in 1992. Adkins landed a development deal with Arista Nashville, but after six months the label lost interest. However, one of Arista Nashville’s executives soon moved to Capitol Records, and when producer Scott Hendricks saw him play a show in Mt. Juliet, Tennessee, he convinced the label to sign Adkins to a recording contract.
Adkins issued his debut album, Dreamin' Out Loud, in 1996, and it established him as a rising star. The lead single, “Every Light in the House,” went to number three; “I Left Something Turned on at Home” hit number two; and “(This Ain’t) No Thinkin’ Thing” went all the way to number one. His 1997 follow-up album, Big Time, spawned another Top Five hit in “The Rest of Mine,” and “Lonely Won’t Leave Me Alone” just missed the Top Ten. However, it wasn’t quite the commercial powerhouse of Dreamin' Out Loud; neither was its follow-up, 1999′s More, which featured just one Top Ten single in the title track. Nonetheless, all three albums made the country Top Ten.
Released in 2001, Chrome brought Adkins into the Top Five of the country album charts for the first time, as the Top Ten lead single “I’m Tryin’” proved to be his biggest hit since “The Rest of Mine.” In July of that year, Adkins was arrested for drunk driving and later pled guilty. The title track of Chrome belatedly climbed into the Top Ten in early 2003. Capitol released Greatest Hits Collection, Vol. 1 in July of 2003 and its companion DVD, Video Hits, in February 2004 with Adkins’ fifth studio album, the December 2003 release Comin' on Strong, sandwiched in between. In 2005, Adkins had a major hit with “Honky Tonk Badonkadonk” from his album Songs About Me. The album Dangerous Man was released a year later. Live in Concert appeared in 2007 as part of the Big Band Concert CD series. X (Ten) was issued in 2008. After the album was released, Adkins left Capitol and signed with Toby Keith’s Show Dog imprint distributed by Universal. In May of 2010 he debuted his first single for the label, “This Ain’t No Love Song.” The album Cowboy's Back in Town was released in August of that year. Adkins saw some chart action from both the album and single; he supported them with an extended tour. While flying to a concert in Alaska on June 4, 2011, Adkins’ home in Brentwood, Tennessee caught fire and burned to the ground. Though his wife, daughters, and a babysitter were at home during the catastrophe, no one was hurt. The title track of his 2011 album, Proud to Be Here, was written by Chris Wallin, Aaron Barker, and Ira Dean with Adkins in mind. The album was preceded by the single “Gone Fishin’,” which peaked at six on the Billboard country charts.
Proud to Be Here wound up debuting at three on the Billboard 2003 but only generated one other charting single, “Million Dollar View,” which scraped the country charts at 38. Two years later, Adkins returned with Love Will..., an album that refashioned the singer as a romantic crooner. It was released in May of 2013, debuting at 14 on the Billboard Top 200. Despite this high initial position, the first single “Watch the World End” didn’t become a hit and neither did the album itself. In September, Showdog and Adkins announced that they were parting ways. A month later, Adkins released the Christmas album The King's Gift on Caliburn Records.
Adkins signed with the Broken Bow subsidiary Wheelhouse in 2015, releasing the single “Jesus and Jones” in early 2016. He continued to work on his debut for the label throughout 2016, releasing the single “Lit” in the summer. The album, titled Watered Down, appeared in March 2017. In 2021, Adkins celebrated the 25th anniversary of the release of his first album with a streaming virtual concert event, Trace 25: Still Dreamin' Out Loud, where he shared stories about his life in music and played a number of his best-known songs. Nine songs from the show would be released as a digital album by Universal. The same year, Adkins brought out a double album of fresh material, The Way I Wanna Go, which featured guest appearances from Luke Bryan, Blake Shelton, Melissa Etheridge, Stevie Wonder, Snoop Dogg, and Pitbull. ~ Steve Huey & Mark Deming