Garth Brooks

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Garth Brooks

Background information
Birth name Troyal Garth Brooks
Born February 7, 1962
Origin Flag of United States Tulsa, Oklahoma, USA
Genre(s) Country
Instrument(s) Vocals
Guitar (Primary Instrument)
Piano
Saxophone
Years active 1989 - 2001
Label(s) Capitol Records
Associated
acts		 Trisha Yearwood (his wife)

Troyal Garth Brooks, born February 7, 1962 in Tulsa, Oklahoma, is an American country music singer-songwriter and charity director.

Brooks's music was ubiquitous in the 1990s. He first became visible the year before the decade began, having come apparently from nowhere, and was an immediate commercial success. Lacking the tall and lanky physical appearance typical of some male country stars, he successfully integrated pop and rock elements into his recordings and live performances. He soon began to dominate the country singles and country album charts and quickly crossed over into the mainstream pop arena, selling records like no one else in country music ever had and exposing country music to a larger audience than previously thought possible.

Brooks enjoyed one of the most successful careers in popular music history, with over 70 hit singles and 15 charted albums to his credit and over 115 million albums sold in the United States alone, breaking records for both sales and concert attendance throughout the 1990s. Possibly dissatisfied and looking to expand his career boundaries, he then attempted an artistically ambitious but never completed multimedia project involving a fictitious alter ego known as Chris Gaines.

Troubled by the conflicts between career and family, the year after the decade ended, Garth Brooks announced his retirement from recording and performing, thereby disappearing from the music world as suddenly as he had come. Brooks has retained a large and loyal fan base around the world.

Contents

[edit] Early life and career

Garth Brooks grew up in Yukon, Oklahoma. His father Ray Brooks worked as a draughtsman for an oil company, while his mother Colleen Carroll was a country music singer on the Capitol Records label in the 1950s and also a regular on the Red Foley Show.

Even as a child, Brooks was interested in music, often singing in casual family settings, but his primary interest was athletics. In high school he played football, baseball, and ran track. After graduation from high school, he attended Oklahoma State University in Stillwater on a track scholarship as a javelin thrower. Despite discontinuing his participation in the sport, he still graduated in 1984 with a degree in advertising.

Later that year, Brooks began his professional singing career, singing and playing guitar in Oklahoma clubs and bars, particularly the Tumbleweed in Stillwater. After a failed 1985 trip to Nashville to gain a record contract, Brooks returned to Oklahoma and in 1986 married Sandy Mahl of Owasso, Oklahoma, whom he had met while working as a bouncer at the Tumbleweed. The following year, the couple moved to Nashville, and Brooks was able to begin making contacts in the music industry.

While struggling to be noticed by industry executives, Brooks frequently recorded demo records for songwriter Kent Blazy. Blazy introduced Brooks to Trisha Yearwood, another unknown aspiring country singer, in October 1987. The pair became immediate friends and pledged to help the other out once one of them made it big. Brooks achieved success first, signing a recording contract with Capitol Records in 1988. Keeping his promise, in 1991 he invited Yearwood to be the opening act on his tour.

[edit] The success begins

Garth Brooks' eponymous first album was released in 1989 and was both a critical and chart success. It peaked at #2 in the US country album chart and reached #13 on the Billboard 200 pop album chart. Most of the album was traditionalist country, influenced in part by George Strait. The first single ahead of it was "Much Too Young To Feel This Damn Old", a country top 10 success. It was followed by his first well-known song, "If Tomorrow Never Comes", which was his first country #1 and is still considered one of his best-crafted efforts. "Not Counting You" reached #2, and then "The Dance" put him at #1 again; this song's theme of people dying in the course of doing something they believe in resonated strongly and together with a popular music video gave Brooks his first push towards a broader audience. Brooks has also claimed that of all the songs he has recorded, "The Dance" is his favorite.

The album No Fences followed in 1990. It reached #1 on the Billboard country music chart (staying there for 23 weeks) and #3 on the pop chart, and would go on to become Brooks' biggest-selling album, with global sales of over 20 million copies. It contained what would become Brooks' signature song, the blue collar anthem "Friends in Low Places", which was a favorite of American troops serving in the 1991 Gulf War. The album contained two other Brooks classics, the dramatic and controversial "The Thunder Rolls" and the philosophically ironic "Unanswered Prayers". Also a hit was the affectionate "Two of a Kind, Workin’ on a Full House"; all four of these songs hit #1 on the country chart.

While Brooks' music was definitely in the country idiom, he had also absorbed a sensibility from the 1970s singer-songwriter movement, especially James Taylor (whom he idolized and named his first child after) and Dan Fogelberg. Similarly, Brooks was influenced by the operatic rock of the 1970s-era Billy Joel and Bruce Springsteen. In his highly successful live shows, Brooks used a wireless headset microphone to free himself to run about the stage, adding energy and arena rock theatrics to spice up the normally staid country music approach to concerts. Finally, Brooks' music was influenced by the progressive bluegrass band New Grass Revival.[citation needed]

[edit] Dominance

[edit] United States

promo shot of Ropin' the Wind
promo shot of Ropin' the Wind

Brooks' third album, Ropin' the Wind, released in September 1991, had advance orders of 4 million copies and entered the pop album charts at #1, a first for a country act. Ropin' the Wind's music was a melange of pop country and honky-tonk; hits included Billy Joel's "Shameless", "What She's Doing Now", and "The River". All told, it became his second-best selling album after No Fences. The success of this album further propelled the sales of his first two albums, enabling Brooks to occupy the top two spots in the pop album chart. Brooks's record sales and concert attendance were extremely high, and by those two markers he was at the time the biggest artist in popular music, a first for a primarily country singer.

After spending time in Los Angeles during the 1992 riots, Brooks co-wrote the gospel-country-tock hybrid "We Shall Be Free" to express his desire for tolerance. The song became the first single off his fourth album The Chase.[1] With its message of support for gay rights, the song met with resistance from country radio stations and from the culturally conservative country audience,[1] and only reached #12 on the country chart, his worst showing to date. Nevertheless, the song often received standing ovations when performed in concert and went to #22 in the Christian charts through a marketing deal with Rick Hendrix Company.

The Chase, which Brooks would later describe as his album that gave the closest look into his mind, would go on to become a huge success, with its next two singles both making it back to #1. But it would not quite match the sales of his previous albums, and marked the beginning of a tension between the music Brooks wanted to make and the music that most of his core audience was willing to accept from him.

[edit] Awards

Brooks won his first Grammy Award for Best Male Country Vocal Performance in 1992 for the album Ropin' the Wind. He was awarded the Academy of Country Music award for Entertainer of the Year for 1990, 1991, 1992 and 1993, and the award for Top Male Vocalist for 1990 and 1991. As a performer and artist he has been compared to fellow country and pop/rock legends, such as the likes of Elvis Presley, The Beatles, Jackson Browne, Kenny Rogers, Clint Black, George Strait, George Jones, and the Eagles.

[edit] Conquering the World

Brooks' August 1993 album In Pieces was another instant number 1 success, selling a total of about 10 million copies world-wide. Some of his fans were upset, however, that the album was not released simultaneously around the world. In the United Kingdom, one of Brooks' most committed fan bases outside the United States, country music disc jockeys, such as Martin Campbell and John Wellington, noted that many fans were buying the album on import; making it the first album to debut in the top 10 of the UK Country album charts before its official release date. Once officially released there, in 1994, the album reached the top spot on the UK Country chart and number two on the UK pop albums chart. That same year "The Red Strokes" became Brooks' first single to make the pop top 40 in the UK, reaching a high of number 13; it was followed by "Standing Outside The Fire", which reached number 23. Previous albums No Fences, Ropin' The Wind and The Chase also remained in the top 30 in the UK.

To support the album, Brooks embarked on a 1994 UK tour, selling out venues such as Birmingham's National Exhibition Centre and London's Wembley Arena. He opened the London radio station, Country 1035 and made a number of other television and radio appearances (see Controversies below). Despite the disdain of the British media, Brooks's overall popularity in the country was evident, with a top disc jockey, Nick Barraclough, referring to Brooks as Garth Vader (a play on Darth Vader) for his "invasion" of the charts and his success as an icon of the country genre. Brooks returned to the UK in 1996 for more sold-out concerts, although this time his media appearances were mostly restricted to country radio and interviews with magazines.

Elsewhere in the world Brooks was also considered a star, and he enjoyed hit records and sell-out tours in countries including Ireland, Spain, throughout Europe, Brazil, the Far East, New Zealand, and Australia.

[edit] Hard Rock

In 1994 Brooks paid homage to one of his musical influences when he appeared on the hard rock compilation Kiss My Ass: Classic Kiss Regrooved, a collection of Kiss cover songs by popular artists from all genres. As the only country performer to participate, some worried that Brooks would turn his cover of the song originally sung by drummer Peter Criss, "Hard Luck Woman", into a country song. Brooks instead insisted on remaining true to the song, and requested that the members of Kiss perform the music on the track, the only song on the album that the band musically contributed. The unlikely collaboration performed the song live on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno in promotion of Kiss My Ass: Classic Kiss Regrooved , and, despite its hard-rock appeal, Brooks's version did appear on the country charts.

[edit] Attendance Records

One of the later peaks in Brooks' fame came on August 7, 1997, when he gave a free concert in New York City's Central Park, drawing hundreds of thousands of people in a city that many would say is far removed from the country music world. Estimates of the actual crowd size varied considerably, from 250,000 to 750,000 or even higher, primarily because many people were enjoying the show from outside the full-to-capacity venue.[2] Brooks himself once said that he "played to over 800,000 people" at the show.[citation needed] An additional 14.6 million viewers watched the performance live on HBO.[citation needed] Billy Joel and Don McLean made guest appearances.[2]

After showing that he still had the ability to draw such a large crowd, it was not surprising that Brooks won the award for the ACM Entertainer of the Year in 1998.

[edit] Family Expansion

While Brooks was steadily expanding his recognition and success in music worldwide, he and Sandy were also concentrating on expanding their family. They had three children in the 1990s: Taylor Mayne Pearl, born July 8, 1992; August Anna, born May 3, 1994; and Allie Colleen, born July 28, 1996.

[edit] "Chris Gaines"

It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Chris Gaines. (Discuss)

Chris Gaines is a fictional rock singer created as an alter ego by Garth Brooks. Gaines was conceived by Brooks as the principal character in his thriller film The Lamb. The film, being produced by Brooks' production company Red Strokes Entertainment and Paramount Pictures, was to revolve around the emotionally conflicted life of Gaines as a musician in the public eye. In an effort to create a larger than life character, Brooks took on the identity of Gaines in the album Garth Brooks In ... The Life of Chris Gaines. The album was released in October 1999 and was intended as a 'pre-soundtrack' to the film. Brooks also subsequently appeared as Gaines in a television mockumentary for the VH1 series Behind The Music and as the musical guest on an episode of Saturday Night Live which he hosted as himself. Brooks' endless promotion of the album and the film did not seem to stir much excitement and the success of the Chris Gaines experiment became fairly evident mere weeks after the album was released. Critics admired Brooks for demonstrating his range as a musician and actor, but the majority of the American public was either totally bewildered, or completely unreceptive to the idea of Garth Brooks as anything but a pop-country singer. Many of his fans also felt that by supporting the Gaines project they would lose the real Garth Brooks. Sales of the album were unspectacular and although it made it to #2 on the pop album chart, expectations had been higher and retail stores began heavily discounting their oversupply. Dismal sales of the album and lack of interest in the film brought the film production to an indefinite hiatus in February of 2001 and Gaines quickly and quietly faded into obscurity. Production on The Lamb was never completed and Brooks has since been wildly criticized for this seemingly odd career move. In 2005, Late Night with Conan O'Brien would display and mention Chris Gaines in its "Late Night Wall of National Jokes".

[edit] Retirement

[edit] Official Retirement

As his career flourished, Brooks seemed frustrated by the conflicts between career and family. He talked of retiring from performing in 1992[1] and 1995, but each time returned to touring. In 1999, possibly also spurred by falling record sales, Brooks appeared on The Nashville Network's Crook & Chase program and again mentioned retirement.[3]

In 1999, Brooks and his wife separated,[4] announcing their plans to divorce on October 9, 2000[5] which became final in 2001.[4]

Two weeks later, on October 26, 2000, Brooks officially announced his retirement from recording and performing.[6] Later that evening, Capitol Records saluted his achievement of selling 100 million albums in the US with a lavish party at Nashville's Gaylord Entertainment Center.[5]

Brooks's final album, Scarecrow was released November 13, 2001. The album did not match the sales levels of Brooks's heyday, but still sold comfortably well, reaching #1 on both the pop and country charts. Although he staged a few performances for promotional purposes, Brooks stated that he would be retired from recording and performing at least until his youngest daughter, Allie, turned 18. Despite ceasing to record new material between 2002 and (most of) 2005, Brook continued to chart with previously recorded material, including a top 30 placing for "Why Ain't I Running" in 2003.

[edit] Second Marriage

On May 25, 2005, Brooks proposed to longtime friend and fellow country music superstar Trisha Yearwood in front of a packed house at Buck Owens' Crystal Palace club in Bakersfield, California. The couple wed on December 10, 2005, at their home in Oklahoma, marking the second marriage for Brooks and the third for Yearwood.

[edit] Partial Comeback

In 2005 Brooks insisted that he was not touring and did not plan to record any new studio material until 2015. However, in August 2005 it was announced that Brooks had signed a deal with Wal-Mart,[7] leasing them the rights to his back catalog following his split with Capitol.[8] Three months later, Brooks and Wal-Mart issued The Limited Series, an inexpensively priced six-CD box set containing past material and a Lost Sessions disc with eleven previously unissued recordings. This set marked the first time in history that a musician had signed an exclusive music distribution deal with a single retailer.[7] The set sold more than 500,000 physical copies on its issue date, proving that Brooks still had a large fan base, and by the first week in December 2005 had sold over 1 million physical copies.[9]

Brooks took a brief break from retirment in late 2005 to perform for several worthy causes. With Yearwood, he sang John Fogerty's "Who'll Stop the Rain" on the Shelter from the Storm: A Concert for the Gulf Coast nationwide telethon for Hurricane Katrina relief.[10] He also released a new single, "Good Ride Cowboy", as a tribute to his late friend, rodeo star and country singer, Chris LeDoux.[11]

Later in the month Brooks performed at the Grand Ole Opry's 80th birthday celebration. Selections included a duet with Steve Wariner on "Long Neck Bottle", another joint effort with country legends Bill Anderson, Porter Wagoner, and Little Jimmy Dickens, and a solo guitar version of "The Dance." On November 15, 2005, he also performed "Good Ride Cowboy" in front of a live audience in Times Square in New York City, as part of the 2005 Country Music Association Awards show. In December, the single reached #1.

In early 2006 Wal-Mart issued The Lost Sessions as a single CD apart from the boxed set, with extra tracks including a top 40 duet with Yearwood, "Love Will Always Win".[12] The couple were later nominated for a "Best Country Collaboration With Vocals" Grammy Award for the song.

All of Brooks's previous studio albums were also re-issued under the umbrella "The Remastered Series".

[edit] Effects of Retirement

During his "retirement" Brooks has sold more records than many modern country artists sell during their entire career. The Wal-Mart box set sold in excess of two million units, while the DVD box set and the CD release of "The Lost Sessions" also sold in the millions.

Brooks proclaims that his job as a father is a lot harder than touring. In a CMT Garth Brooks concert special he also remarked "I love what I'm doing, but I miss what I did." In virtually every interview he has done in 2006, Brooks has talked about whether he's going to stage another tour, often saying "if the door opens up" he would have a tour that is better than anything he's ever done.

[edit] Charitable activities

In 1991, Brooks took part in Voices That Care, a multi-artist project that featured other top names in music for a one-off single to raise money for the allied troops in the Gulf War. The project included fellow country singers Randy Travis, Kenny Rogers and Kathy Mattea.

In 1999, Garth Brooks began the Teammates for Kids Foundation which provides financial aid to charities for children. The organization breaks down into three categories spanning three different sports.

  • Touch 'Em All Foundation - Baseball Division
  • Top Shelf - Hockey Division
  • Touchdown - Football Division

The foundation enlists players to donate a predetermined sum of money depending on their game performance. Brooks has participated in spring training for the San Diego Padres in 1998 and 1999; the New York Mets in 2000, and most recently with the Kansas City Royals in 2004 to promote his foundation.

Brooks is also a fundraiser for various other charities, including a number of children's charities and famine relief. He has also donated at least $1 million to wildlife causes.

[edit] Support for gay rights

In 2000, Brooks appeared at the Equality Rocks benefit concert for gay rights. He sang a duet with openly gay singer George Michael.

In the lyrics to his song "We Shall Be Free", Brooks sings "When we're free to love anyone we choose," a possible reference to gay relationships. Brooks won a 1993 GLAAD Media Award for the song and his subsequent comments about it, such as, "But if you're in love, you've got to follow your heart and trust that God will explain to us why we sometimes fall in love with people of the same sex."[13]

Brooks' sister and live bassist somewhat early in his career, Betsy Smittle, is a well-known lesbian entertainer in Tulsa. She has worked with the late country star Gus Hardin and several Tulsa musicians. Because of Brooks' gay-positive comments, and the close and heavily publicized relationship with his sister, Brooks has become one of very few country music gay icons.

[edit] Controversies

[edit] Used CDs

In 1993, Garth Brooks, who had criticized music stores which sold used CDs since it led to a loss in royalty payments, persuaded Capitol Records not to ship his album In Pieces to stores which engaged in such practices. This led to several anti-trust lawsuits against the record label and ended with Capitol shipping the CDs to the stores after all.[14] Brooks lamented that the record label had "sold out".[citation needed]

[edit] Rude treatment from British media

During Brooks' 1994 tour of the UK he made a number of general radio and television appearances, where he was often mocked by the presenters. On ITV's regional news show London Tonight, Brooks was described as "a top-selling, rooting tooting, cotton picking, Country and Western star, yeeha!" The nationwide Big Breakfast show's presenters Chris Evans and Paula Yates, commented that "He's selling more records than anyone in the world, but none of us have ever heard of him." Yates then told Brooks that, "Country singers always seem to be weeping over the dead dog and things," and also remarked, "I thought you'd come in here and twiddle your pistol around and be impressed." Although Brooks remained polite, he did observe that Yates was obviously unfamiliar with modern country music. Scores of Brooks fans later wrote to complain about his treatment on the show. Sometime after this, Dwight Yoakam appeared on the same show and after Yates told him, "You seem different from other Country singers we've had on the show," Yoakam replied, "What? All two of us?"

In a radio interview with British Country disc jockey John Wellington, Brooks was quoted as saying, "Yeah I was shocked at the reaction I got from the crowd in London. From the media attention I got, I thought country music didn't exist here, but Country music is alive and well in London, as well as all of England." Unlike Alan Jackson, who refused to return to the UK after being treated in a similar manner by the press, Brooks returned in 1996 for more sell out concerts, although this time his media appearances were mostly restricted to country radio and interviews with magazines.

[edit] Best selling solo artist?

In 1999 the Recording Industry Association of America made an announcement that Garth Brooks was the best-selling solo artist of the 20th century in America.[15] This conclusion drew a fair amount of disbelief and outrage from the press and music fans, who did not feel that Brooks had the stature or musical gravitas for this distinction, and who felt that surely Elvis Presley must have sold more records than Brooks. This latter point led to much discussion and criticism of how RIAA does its certifications and lifetime totals, and how those methods may well have been faulty during the period decades ago in which Presley got many of his sales.[16][17] Brooks, while proud of his sales accomplishments, deferred to "The King" and stated that he too believed that Presley must have sold more.[16]

The RIAA has since reexamined their methods for counting certifications. Under the new methods, Presley is the best-selling solo artist in U.S. history, making Brooks the number two solo artist. Brooks ranks third overall, as The Beatles have sold more albums than either he or Presley.[18] The revision brought more criticism of the accuracy of the RIAA's figures, this time from Brooks' followers.

On November 1, 2006, Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. announced that Garth Brooks made history as the company's top selling music artist of all time. With nearly 20 million discs sold at Wal-Mart in the first year of his exclusive relationship with the retailer, Brooks has been able to transcend his retirement and continue his history-making performances.

The milestone comes just days prior to the launch of Garth's most limited production release to date. The latest exclusive offering from singer/songwriter Brooks is a limited five DVD set, appropriately titled Garth Brooks: The Entertainer. This limited edition has already become the number one pre-order item on Walmart.com Music in 2006.

Last year's boxed set release, Garth Brooks: The Limited Series, sold half a million copies in its first day of availability.

[edit] Absence on the pop singles charts

While Brooks scored many number ones on the Billboard 200 pop album chart, very few of his singles reached the parallel Billboard Hot 100 singles chart, an odd discrepancy. The Hot 100 chart has been the subject of much criticism over the years due to the way it has been compiled, especially since it stopped using sales as its main source of information. In 2005, long after Brooks' peak success, the Pop 100 was launched by Billboard in answer to these critics. Although this new chart is still criticized by some, it shows stronger placings for country songs, in addition to this, he has also had stronger placings on another Billboard pop music chart, Top 40 Mainstream, since it began in the late 1990s. Still, no solo male country artist has topped the Billboard pop music singles chart since Kenny Rogers in 1980, despite the many who have had #1's on the pop album listings (a chart based purely upon sales).

[edit] Supposed Affair with Trisha Yearwood

In the mid-1990s Brooks publicly admitted that he had been unfaithful to his wife Sandy. Many tabloids reported throughout the decade that he was actually having an affair with longtime friend and collaborator Trisha Yearwood. The two have continually denied having had an affair.[19] Garth and Sandy Brooks divorced in 2000, and he married Yearwood in 2005.

[edit] Awards

[edit] Discography

For a list of singles and albums, see Garth Brooks discography

  • Garth Brooks is the only artist to have seven albums debut #1 on both The Billboard 200 and Billboard's Top Country Albums charts: Ropin' the Wind, The Chase, In Pieces, Sevens, The Limited Series, Double Live, Scarecrow, in addition Fresh Horses debuted at #1 on the country chart and #2 on the pop 200.
  • Capitol Records shipped 5 million copies of The Chase which, at the time, was the largest initial shipment in music history.
  • Fresh Horses was the first album to have 8 out of 10 tracks on the country music singles charts at the same time, while his follow-up album Sevens broke that record, with 12 out of 14 tracks on the singles charts.
  • Garth Brooks was the first artist to debut a live album at #1 on two charts (Double Live).
  • Double Live is the best-selling live album in music history and the fastest selling country music album ever
  • Brooks had three albums at the top of the Billboard pop charts at the same time in 1998 (Sevens, The Limited Series, and Double Live). He was the first to do this since Elton John in 1975.
  • Brooks has four albums certified diamond (more than 10 million copies), a record for a male solo performer, and the third overall (behind The Beatles with six and Led Zeppelin with five).[15]
  • To date, the RIAA have certified his albums at 116x Platinum, U.S sales stand at 103.5 million.[18]

[edit] See also

[edit] Footnotes

  1. ^ a b c Garth Brooks Does What He Has To - Signing a Rich New Contract and Repairing L.A.. The Los Angeles Times (January 23, 1993). Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  2. ^ a b Garth has friends in grassy places. CNN (August 7, 1997). Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  3. ^ Boehlert, Eric (December 16, 1999). Garth Brooks Ponders Retirement Amid Sales Slump. Rolling Stone. Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  4. ^ a b Garth Brooks' divorce finalised. BBC News (December 18, 2001). Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  5. ^ a b Rosen, Craig (October 9, 2000). Garth Brooks To Divorce. Yahoo Music. Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  6. ^ Rosen, Craig (October 26, 2000). Garth Brooks Announces Retirement. Yahoo Music. Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  7. ^ a b Newman, Melinda (August 19, 2005). Garth Brooks Inks Exclusive Deal with Wal-Mart. Billboard Magazine. Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  8. ^ Garth Brooks Leaves Label. Country Weekly (June 6, 2005). Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  9. ^ Garth cracks a Million - again. Country Weekly (December 8, 2005). Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  10. ^ Shelter from the Storm: A Concert for the Gulf Coast. ABC (September, 2005). Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  11. ^ Garth Brooks Boxed Set is Single Biggest Music Event in Wal-Mart History. Wal-Mart (November 29, 2005). Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  12. ^ Garth's "Lost Sessions" Available Soon. Country Weekly (January 16, 2006). Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  13. ^ http://gaytoday.badpuppy.com/garchive/entertain/040599en.htm
  14. ^ Philips, Chuck (August 8, 1993). Garth Brooks' distributor says stores dealing in the second hand goods can order his new album.. Los Angeles Times. Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  15. ^ a b The American Recording Industry Announces its Artists of the Century. RIAA (November 10, 1999). Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  16. ^ a b Is Elvis the Biggest Selling Recording Artist?. Elvis Information Network. Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  17. ^ Quinn, Brian. Elvis' American Record Sales A Request for Action. Elvis World-Japan. Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  18. ^ a b Top Artists. RIAA (July 31, 2006). Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
  19. ^ MacDonald, Patrick (July 8, 1998). Garth and Trisha, A dynamic duo. The Seattle Times. Retrieved on 2007-03-16.

[edit] References

[edit] External links

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