Country Is Well-Represented In Film

Thomas Rhett, Hunter Hayes, Lady Antebellum, Eric Paslay, Kacey Musgraves, Kip Moore, David Nail, Thompson Square and Colbie Caillat, among others, are among the artists featured on The Best of Me soundtrack.

“Having a song in The Best of Me soundtrack is really cool for me," says Thomas. "Me and my wife have been huge fans of Nicholas Sparks for a long time. I thinkt hat most girls were since they saw The Notebook. For me, I actually got to read the book, The Best of Me, which was awesome. This is the first song I’ve ever had in a movie before. So, it’s a really cool thing,"

Hunter agrees, and says it's a dream come true for him to have a song in the movie. "One of the coolest things as a songwriter is being anywhere at any point in time and being caught off guard by hearing your song," says Hunter. "And one of the coolest, I’ve always thought, one of the biggest dreams is sitting in a movie theater watching a movie [and having your song come on]."

The soundtrack to the film was released this week, while the film adaptation of Nicholas Sparks' film hits theaters nationwide October 17th.

David Nail: Country Hits And Football Picks

Nail is a sports enthusiast, who could probably quote you stats on football, baseball and basketball, if not curling. Before heading to Nashville, he was more interested in sports than music, and was even a baseball star in high school with a batting average of .385 and set the school record by stealing 21 bases during his senior year. So, as an avid sports fan, he’ll be watching the NFL playoffs this weekend, even though his beloved St. Louis Rams won’t be playing.

We asked him who he’d like to see come out on top of the two playoff games this season, and his picks (or certainly the reasons behind his choices) might surprise you.

“[San Francisco quarterback] Colin Kaepernick was right behind us on the red carpet at the ACM Awards and was super nice guy and talked to my wife, and she acted like she knew who he was and what he did which she had no clue, but she played it off really nicely,” says David. “So, we’ve been kind of rooting secretly for him throughout the playoffs. I love the city of Seattle, and I know it’d be great for them as well. So, that one’s a tough one. The AFC is equally as tough because I love both quarterbacks, Peyton [Manning] and Tom Brady, as well. But, I was driving in and on the radio, they just came out with the fact that Tom Brady was the most-hated quarterback in the NFL, because he was ridiculously good-looking and he married a supermodel wife. I said that was absolutely ridiculous that that would make him the most-hated guy, because he’s like the most non-arrogant, just seems like a regular old guy, if you kind of know his past. And so, I kind of made a decision there that I’m gonna root for Tom Brady, which is going to be tough. So, I’m rooting for two teams that are probably the underdogs.”

David is charging up the field on the country charts with his latest single, “Whatever She’s Got,” the first single from his forthcoming I’m a Fire, due in stores March 4th.

David Nail Begins His Fall Tour This Week

Nail's Fall 2013 tour begins on September 12th (Davie, FL) and currently scheduled to run through November 22nd (Atlanta, GA).

The tour will take David through New York City, Atlanta, Tampa, Minneapolis, Fort Worth, Chicago and Boston to name a few. See bottom for full list of tour dates.

In May, Nail released “Whatever She’s Got,” the debut single off Nail’s forthcoming 2014 album. “Whatever She’s Got” (written by Jimmy Robbins and Jon Nite) is a song that Nail said he recorded for his wife, Catherine.

Dierks Bentley Cohosts "The View" Friday

Dierks will make a stop in New York this week to co-host The View! The episode will air this Friday, July 26 at 10:00am CT on ABC.

Dierks will also reveal his new single with a first-time television performance of the new song off his forthcoming album RISER.

His "Country Cares" Concert including The Band Perry, Randy Houser and David Nail for families of the 19 Granite Mountain firefighters that died battling Arizona wildfires was held this past Monday.

The event, promoted by both KMLE/Phoenix and KAFF/Flagstaff, raised over $475,000.

More artists announced for CMA Music Festival

It's time to start planning your daily music stops at the 2013 CMA Music Festival as CMA just announced more than 30 artists that will perform on the Chevrolet Riverfront Stage. The lineup includes Brett Eldredge, Sara Evans, Gloriana, Casey James, Craig Morgan, David Nail, Jerrod Niemann, Eric Paslay, Tate Stevens, Gretchen Wilson and more! Visit CMAfest.com for the full lineup and to begin adding your favorites to your own schedule!

Tickets to the nightly LP Field concerts sold out faster than ever (a record-setting six weeks in advance), but the good news for the fans is if you didn’t get a ticket for LP Field there are nine other entertainment and music stages, plus special events, and activities throughout downtown Nashville to enjoy for free.

David Nail To Kick Off "Small Hall Headline Fall Tour"

Having spent the last two years on tour with Taylor Swift, Lady Antebellum, Billy Currington and Gavin DeGraw, David Nail understands working the big rooms – but there’s still nothing he enjoys more than a packed club where the fans have come to hear the Grammy-nominated vocalist go deep into his own music. Sept. 6 at Cincinnati’s Toby Keith’s I Love This Bar & Grill, the Kennett, Missourian kicks off a fall tour that focuses on making the music as intimate as possible for as many fans who want to come.

“I’ve been blessed with some pretty great songs, and you just can’t get them all in during a shorter set,” says the son of a high school band director. “The great thing about playing your own shows, you can play all the music you want to – and a lot of the great album cuts get to be heard, which is a lot of times what fans tell me they like the best.”

“Some of these rooms – like Joe’s in Chicago and the Royale in Boston – feel like home, because we’ve built something there and the fans feel like old friends,” Nail says. “They know the songs; they come to hear what we’re gonna do with them that night. They want to see how the songs expand, and we try to give’em an even better show each time…I can’t wait.”

Along with the various clubs, small halls and occasional festival, Nail will also hit Pittsburgh on Sept. 26 for the Country For A Cure concert to benefit the Payton Wright Foundation and Cancer & Blood Disorders Auxiliary of the Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh.

The Sound Of A Million of David Nail's Dreams

When Nail headed to the historic Alabama Theatre in Birmingham, he knew that the dreams songs held for people were as vast as the people themselves - and it made his goal of creating a video for the title track to his The Sound of a Million Dreams something that could evoke those meanings without taking away people's most essential truths. Working with award-winning director Chris Hicky, the singer, recently tapped as one of People Country's Hottest Guys, created a tour de force music video that balances the song's elegance with the passion the Kennett, Missourian brings to his music.

 "That was the hardest thing," Nail acknowledges. "Knowing how specific certain songs can be to me - and knowing it's like that for other people, too. I don't wanna drown their version with my memories, but I always wanted to make sure people understood how personal music is to me and how much of my life is tied up in these songs: both the ones that I sing and the ones that I love."

Still, it's hard not to be moved by the video clip of Nail's father introducing his 6-year old son who comes out to the drums at a music recital, or watching the young man come of age. It is in making the personal universal that the video for "Dreams" finds much of its power. Closing with footage of his maternal Grandfather saying "Next time I'll come to Vegas...," you see how deep the blood runs.

Thompson Square Cancels CRS "New Faces" Appearance

It is with a heavy heart that we inform you that Shawna Thompson's father George Michael "Mickey" Mcllwain passed away yesterday evening in Alabama after a valiant battle with cancer. Shawna and her family were by his side when he passed. Please keep both Shawna and Keifer as well as Shawna's family in your thoughts and prayers during this incredibly difficult time.

As a result, they had to miss the opportunity to appear at the Country Radio Seminar's final event.

Get More: Glass, Thompson Square, Thompson Square Videos

MCA Recording Artist David Nail, who also was a CRS New Face of 2012, will fill in for Thompson Square this weekend at The Palace of Auburn Hills in Detroit, MI and the Ford Center in Evansville, IN.

David Nail Celebrates Glen Campbell

With his own “Let It Rain” poised at #2 and fighting to make the top of the charts, David Nail made good on the dream of a lifetime: getting to see celebrated vocalist/guitarist Glen Campbell at the Ryman Auditorium on his final tour.

A long cited influence on the Kennett, Missourian, seeing the man known for “Galveston,” “Wichita Lineman,” “By The Time I Get To Phoenix,” and “Gentle On My Mind,” who is now faced with advancing Alzheimer’s Disease, provided inspiration and a sense of connection for the young man who’s already been given a Grammy nomination for his own vocal abilities.

“Obviously some of his ability comes from muscle memory,” says the man who was an accomplished baseball player earlier in life, “but the heart, the soul that he brings those songs, that comes from some place deep inside. That – even with teleprompter – is why he is an artist who made such a mark, and who continues to influence people like me all these years later. I didn’t experience him on the radio, I found him… and Glen Campbell – who I found some time in the 90s through a Greatest Hits I played top bottom again and again – defines what it means to be a singer.”

So great was Nail’s desire to experience his idol, that the often subdued musician left his wife Catherine – celebrated on his brand new Turning Home’s restrained ballad of the same name -- home on her birthday to attend the show.

James Keach, a noted film producer/writer/director whose work includes “Walk The Line” and “The Long Riders,” is currently at work on a documentary about the former CMA Entertainer of the Year. When he heard about Nail’s reverence for Campbell, Keach offered a last minute invitation to sit for an interview for the as yet untitled project, which is next heading to New York City to capture Campbell’s Jan. 7 show at Town Hall and interview leading specialists from the Mayo Clinic.

“When I turned the guys in my band, who’re even younger than me, onto Ghost on the Canvas (Campbell’s final recording), they didn’t really know who he was,” Nail says. “Now it’s something every one of them is suggesting we play on the bus. He hasn’t just survived, he’s remained an artist who makes a mark, which is something I think anyone who does this should aspire to.”

Nail, who last year saw an Academy of Country Music Single of the Year nomination for “Red Light” and Grammy Vocal nod for “Turning Home,” is hoping to see yet another dream come true – as “Let It Rain,” the sweeping ballad about owning the consequences of one’s mistakes, is poised to possibly become the first #1 in a career that David Nail has spent a lifetime trying to build.

“It’s been a year of incredible firsts... the Academy of Country Music nomination, the Grammy nomination, singing ‘America The Beautiful’ at the World Series 7th game, performing with Train, getting to tour with Taylor Swift and Lady A, who’re coming into their own dreams, too, in such a powerful way. I called my album The Sound of a Million Dreams because that’s how it feels – and every day, it seems like another one comes true… And certainly that’s what having a #1 record would be.”

The Sound Of A Million Dreams

When David Nail released this album he was looking to make good on the Grammy nomination for Best Country Vocal Performance Male earned by his debut’s “Turning Home” and the Academy of Country Music Single of the Year nomination for “Red Light.”

What he reaped is a list of critical accolades – form the Los Angeles Times, Entertainment Weekly, The Washington Post and the Associated Press – that recognizes his artistic growth and commitment to making music that matters. His “Let It Rain” sits at #4 with a bullet on the country singles chart and has been named one of Amazon.com’s Top 10 Country Songs of 2011 and The Sound of Million Dreams made it’s way onto AOL’s Top 11 Country Albums of 2011, but MTV’s Hive has called Nail’s sophomore release “Overlooked Albums of 2011” in their annual Best of 2011.

“I don’t know why they wouldn’t like it,” says the Kennett, Missourian, “because I think it’s honest music – and whether you’re into Jay Z or Nine Inch Nails, the intensity of the truth comes through. MTV picked my record and Darrell Scott’s record, who was out on tour as part of Robert Plant’s Band of Joy, so I guess they were looking for something that felt real.”

Reviews: “Listen, and let your dreams run wild,” encouraged USA Today, while The Los Angeles Times offered, “songs that chip away at regret, missteps and other human failings, grist for the richest life lessons… Nail seems eager to take on real life” and Entertainment Weekly opined, “a voice that’s even easier listening than Keith Urban’s…” Also, Billboard weighed in with “Stunning. A masterful storyteller, Nail is at his best when he slows down and releases that Mississippi River-drenched voice” and The Washington Post raved, “Nail’s robust tenor might be the most limber and soulful this side of Ronnie Dunn.”

Flood Relief For Missouri

Missouri native David Nail will be heading back home to headline the “David Nail Flood Relief Benefit Concert” to raise money for the thousands of residents in Southeast Missouri who have been pushed out of their homes and lost most, if not all, of their personal belongings.


The benefit concert will be May 27 at 7 pm at the Sikeston High School Fieldhouse in Sikeston, Missouri.
“I think it’s human nature to want to help out anytime you see those struck by the devastation that the recent weather has caused in parts of the southeast and Midwest,” said David Nail. “Being from southeast Missouri, obviously their struggles have hit me the hardest. This show will hopefully rally the spirits of those affected!”


Tickets are $10 and can be purchased by calling 1-800-821-3093 or going to Semo Flood Relief.


All money raised at this flood benefit concert will be dispersed by the Semo Health Network.