ARTIST BIO:

Blake Shelton is many things. He is the hugely popular coach on the top-rated television music competition show The Voice, where singers he’s mentored have won three of six seasons. He is the reigning CMA Male Vocalist of the Year. He’s the charismatic live entertainer performing to packed houses in arenas, amphitheaters and stadiums across the country. He’s husband to country superstar Miranda Lambert, together inspiring endless public fascination as country’s “Power Couple.”

But the one overriding facet of who Blake Shelton is led him down a path that made all these other designations possible. Blake Shelton is a Country. Music. Singer.

Shelton is in a league of his own among contemporary country artists as a top-shelf interpreter of true country music songs, and Shelton’s 11^th studio album, BRINGING BACK THE SUNSHINE, marks a return to showcasing that talent with an album that sonically represents the best contemporary country has to offer, yet feels like the classic cuts served up by the heroes that inspired Shelton as young boy in Ada., Oklahoma some 30 years ago. It’s a journey that includes a CMA Entertainer of the Year trophy, three RIAA certified Platinum albums, five RIAA certified Gold albums, 17 total No. 1 country singles,7.6 million albums and 22.8 million singles sold, and a four-year run as reigning CMA Male Vocalist of the Year.

On BRINGING BACK THE SUNSHINE, producer Scott Hendricks, Shelton’s longtime friend and collaborator, created an album that highlights what is arguably the most powerful vocals Blake Shelton has ever recorded. “If there’s one thing that is important to me, no matter what, it’s singing,” says Shelton. “I’m a fan of a lot of artists, but I always gravitate to the singers, and that’s why I always looked up to Earl Thomas Conley, Travis Tritt, Ronnie Milsap, Conway Twitty. These guys never went through the motions when it came to laying down a vocal.”

“That’s my job, to be the best singer I can be when I get in the studio,” says Shelton. “I don’t ever want someone to hear me on the radio and say ‘yeah, he’s singing okay, but where’s the heart?’ I want it all to be in there.”

From soaring confessionals and convincing professions of love and loss in cuts like the steel-drenched nostalgia of “Good Country Song,” the yearning “Sangria,” and the vulnerability of “Anyone Else,” to immediately memorable up- and mid-tempos such as the hilarious “Buzzin’,” innocent romanticism of “Gonna” and the Southern rock/country blend of the title cut, SUNSHINE is an album of highlights, and the exact tonic country music needs right now.

In short, SUNSHINE is a sterling example of what contemporary country music can be at its best, unfettered by outside influences and trends. “Our goal every time is to make the best record we can possibly make, and not let any politics or anything else get in the way of that,” says Shelton. “It’s me coming in and trying to be the best singer I can be, and Scott pushing me to do that, along with all the other jobs he has of making a record.”

Thirteen years since his first single “Austin” hit the top of the country radio charts, Shelton now holds 17 No. 1 singles to his credit, recently breaking his own record for most consecutive No. 1s at country radio. With 12 singles, including five from his last album alone, Shelton has the most No. 1s in a row on the country radio charts by any artist.

That unprecedented hot streak seems destined to continue on SUNSHINE, a recording process that begins with Shelton’s and Hendricks’ never-ending search for the perfect songs for Shelton’s supple baritone and demanding lyrical standards. “The only thing I really knew I wanted to do for sure—and Scott agreed—was, ‘let’s make a ‘country-er’ record than we’ve made in a while,” Shelton says, “and I do think we accomplished that. It definitely has elements of things you hear on the radio now, but I think it’s more of a throwback to some of those earlier albums I made with [producer] Bobby Braddock, as far as the lyrical content and even the melodies.”

BRINGING BACK THE SUNSHINE showcases the many facets of a complicated person with a simple mission: creating a diverse, powerful country music album.

SUNSHINE taps into Shelton’s innate vocal rhythm, resulting in songs that are more pulsing than pounding, tempo notwithstanding. “It’s an accident, but it’s still by design of trying to keep the pulse up a little bit,” Shelton says, “while not getting too boring, because I do tend to be a ballad singer.”

So even if SUNSHINE finds Shelton entering a new phase of his career, the record still finds simultaneously him looking back and forward, in tone if not overall musicality. He’s still that guy who forfeited high school athletics to play gigs, who obsessed over the liners of each new country album he bought, who took off for Nashville at 17 armed with nothing but a dream and a country voice for the ages.

“It’s very important to me to push myself and push boundaries, musically and artistically, and always be looking for what’s next,” he says. “But it’s also important for me to come back and touch home base every once in a while, to be sure there’s always a firm foot planted in country music. Country’s defined a lot of different ways by a lot of different people, and I’m sure there are other people out there that will listen to ‘A Good Country Song’ and say ‘aw, that ain’t country.’ But country’s defined by each individual, and this is my definition of stepping back a little bit, let’s make a record that represents the beginning of my career, but also blending with where I’ve ended up. I think there’s still a place for that in country radio, and it’s important as an industry that we all don’t get too far away from home.”

This past summer, Shelton has been away from home performing before hordes of fans who have turned out for sold-out shows at iconic venues like New York’s Madison Square Garden, LA’s Hollywood Bowl and Chicago’s Wrigley Field. Shelton is wrapping the biggest tour of his career, but finds getting face-to-face with fans rewarding on multiple levels. “It’s so exciting to look down and see a six year old girl singing the words to ‘Ol’ Red’ or ‘Austin,’ and then look over and see a 60 year-old woman singing ‘Boys ‘Round Here,’ singing ‘backwoods legit, don’t take no shit.’ I always said my ultimate goal is to have a career like George Strait, and although I haven’t done that—and nobody probably ever will—that is my goal. And to step out there and see that it’s going from one generation to another, that’s the most satisfying and exciting thing that any artist can accomplish.”

So if the more seasoned and savvy TV era Blake could tell the driven 17 year-old Blake that headed off to Nashville anything, “I’d tell him just to relax and stop worrying so much,” he says. “I knew the one thing that I wanted to do with my life was country music, it worried me to death. I was never one of those people who was like, ‘I’ll give it a shot for a while and then move on.’ It never was that for me, it was ‘how am I gonna get this done, how am I gonna get my foot in the door?’ Even after I had a hit or two, it was worry of ‘how can I keep this going?’ It wasn’t until the last three or four years that I finally started taking a deep breath and going, ‘man, I get to be a country singer, and it’s OK.’ I get to do it now. I don’t care at what level, as long as I get to be country singer,’ that’s all I ever wanted to do.”