To get anywhere in life, sometimes you need to take a few big risks. Naturally, those risks can yield disastrous results. However, nothing guarantees you won’t grow at all in life quite like avoiding risks. The following country artists redefined their careers by taking risks, and one of them almost outright destroyed their career over it. Let’s take a look, shall we?
1. Dierks Bentley
Trends ebb and flow throughout the country music industry. Once a country star gets a taste of success, it’s often vital for them to either jump on industry trends or continue doing what made them so popular in the first place. Dierks Bentley, however, opted for neither route. After making it big with just three records under his belt, Bentley decided to defy expectations in 2010 and released a bluegrass album.
It worked out. Up On The Ridge was a chart-topping hit, and it’s still considered one of the best records to come out of the year 2010. The album also pulled in a whole new pool of fans that Bentley might have otherwise not gained if he hadn’t gotten risky with a bluegrass record.
2. Tim McGraw
Tim McGraw is the most famous country star to be involved with that intense Curb Records legal battle in the early aughts. However, it also involved musicians like LeAnn Rimes, among others.
Basically, McGraw was the biggest country star ever at the cusp of the 2010s. He wasn’t happy with his label, though, and sought his freedom from it with a few contract-breaching moves in 2011. Later in 2011, Curb sued him for breaching his contract. In a stunning turn of events, McGraw filed a countersuit and won. He was free of his label, launched his own, then moved to Big Machine. His first album after gaining his freedom, aptly titled Two Lanes Of Freedom, was a no. 2 hit on the country charts.
3. Toby Keith
Toby Keith took a big risk in the early 2000s by dumping quite a bit of money into the launch of his own label, Show Dog Nashville. This could have been a disastrous move, and one that could have alienated him from Nashville labels should his launch have failed.
Luckily for Keith, it didn’t. Keith released quite a few albums on his own label, plus a few compilation records that did very well. He also signed the likes of Trace Adkins and Waterloo Revival after merging Show Dog with Universal. Overall, it was a big success that inspired other country musicians to take more control over their music.
4. Natalie Maines
Natalie Maines earns a spot on our list of country artists who redefined their careers after big risks, even though her political stance temporarily destroyed her career. In 2003, Maines, a member of The Dixie Chicks, made a negative remark about then-President George W. Bush to an audience.
The pushback was catastrophic and nearly destroyed her career. In a way, it did destroy her career, albeit temporarily. The band released Taking The Long Way a few years after the controversy. While it didn’t get much airplay, it managed to top the country and pop charts and earn several Grammy Awards. That’s a success in my book.
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