Granger Smith

Born and raised in Dallas, the Texas country artist Granger Smith launched his recording career as a Texas A&M student, finishing his debut album Waiting on Forever in 1998 during his freshman year. Over the following fifteen years he issued five additional self-released studio projects before securing broader distribution for the 2013 album Dirt Road Driveway, which he wrote, recorded, and produced entirely in his home studio. Momentum built sharply in 2015 when the four-track EP 4x4 generated three strong Top 20 country singles, and that momentum carried forward with the full-length releases When the Good Guys Win in 2017 and Country Things in 2020. His eleventh studio album, Moonrise, arrived in 2022.

Smith had already been performing on the Texas circuit since age fourteen when he entered the studio at nineteen to cut Waiting on Forever. A couple of years later he secured a writing and publishing agreement with EMI Music Publishing, then left Texas A&M during his junior year to move to Nashville, where he honed his craft while playing local clubs. He issued the self-released albums Memory RD. and Pockets of Pesos in 2005, completed his Texas A&M degree, and followed with Livin’ Like a Lonestar in 2006 and We Bleed Maroon in 2007. Returning to Texas, he became a fixture on the regional circuit, releasing Don’t Listen to the Radio in 2009 and the 2012 projects Live at the Chicken: 11-20-11 and Poets & Prisoners. Dirt Road Driveway appeared the next year and featured two tracks credited to his comedic alter ego Earl Dibbles, Jr.: “Country Boy Love” and “The Country Boy Song.”

The 2015 EP 4x4 reached number six on the Country Albums chart and number 51 on the Billboard 200 while “Backroad Song” topped the Country Airplay chart. In January 2016 Taste of Country named him its Hottest Artist to Watch, and his major-label debut Remington appeared that March. When the Good Guys Win, his ninth studio album, followed in 2017 and included the single “Happens Like That.” In 2018 Smith directed the documentary They Were There, A Hero’s Documentary and issued its accompanying soundtrack. During 2020 he released the EPs Country Things, Vol. 1 and Country Things, Vol. 2 before combining them into the full-length album Country Things. Moonrise arrived in 2022, and that same year he joined High Valley on the Canadian hit “Country Music, Girls and Trucks.”