Keith, Toby (8th July 1961-Present)

He was a singer-songwriter born Toby Keith Covel in Clinton, Oklahoma, and raised in Moore, Oklahoma, where his grandmother had a supper club.

He started to gain an interest in music from hearing the acts performing at the club and it was taken further then he was given his first guitar when he was eight. After his high school graduation he began work in local oil fields, progressing to the position of Operation Manager. During these years he formed the band Easy Money who performed at local venues but in 1982 he found himself out of work when the oil industry went downhill where he was. Having been an avid footballer while at school he became a semi-pro with the Oklahoma City Drillers and continued working with his band.

1984 came around and he married his girlfriend Tricia and decided that he was going to try his hand at making a living at music with his band, although his friends and family were sceptical about it. They performed in venues in Texas and Oklahoma and then went into the recording studio and cut the single “Blue Moon”. Trying his luck in Nashville he went and gave demos of his band to record companies situated there and also worked as a busker. It was a fruitless task and so, dejected, he returned home.

All was not lost though as after a fan of his, who was a flight attendant, passed a demo of his to Mercury Records’ Harlold Shedd things started to turn around. Harold Shedd went to see him playing at a gig and before he knew it he received his much sought after recording contract and was catapulted into the limelight when he hit the No. 1 spot on the Billboard Country charts in 1993 with his first release, “Should’ve Been a Cowboy”.

The accompanying self-title album also shot to the top and achieved platinum status with the further hits “A Little Less Talk and a Lot More Action” and “Wish I Didn’t Know”. From 1994 to 1996 he spent time recording with Polydor and then returned to Mercury. He began working on TV commercials for Telecom USA and then later became known for singing “Field Trip (Look Again)” and “Ford Truck Man” for Ford Truck commercials.

2001 had a very personal effect on him as his father was killed in an accident (the family would later receive compensation) and later there was the tragedy of 9/11. These two events spurred him to writing “Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue (The Angry American)”, which he would later record and take to the No. 1 spot in 2002. The song wasn’t without controversy though and started a feud with The Dixie Chicks.

During the war in Iraq in the mid-2000s he performed in a USO sponsored concert for the troops, where he met and later toured with Ted Nugent. In 2005 he established his own Show Dog Nashville record label and began releasing more of his own albums and the soundtrack to Broken Bridges, which he also starred in alongside Tess Harper, Burt Reynolds and Kelly Preston. Also in 2005 he went back to his home state and launched Toby Keith’s I Live This Bar & Grill in two cities.

He worked with several other artists in the business including Jimmy Buffett, Emmylou Harris and Sting. Albums he appeared on and/or produced include his own Big Dog Daddy, Blue Moon, Boomtown, Christmas to Christmas, Dream Walkin’, High Maintenance Woman, How Do You Like Me Now, She’s a Hottie and White Trash With Money as well as Stars and Stripes Vol. 1 by The Beach Boys, License to Chill by Jimmy Buffett, Hag: The Best of… by Merle Haggard and Outlaws & Angels by Willie Nelson & Friends.

He received 6 Academy of Country Music awards, 2 Country Music Association awards and 2 American Music Awards. He also achieved 21 Billboard Country chart No. 1 singles and 21 Top 10 hits, nine No. 1 albums and wrote the script for Beer for My Horses, which is based on the hit of the same name he had with Willie Nelson.

He became the first musician to ever be given a five-star rating by Stephen Colbert on The Colbert Report and in 2011 was named “Artist of the Decade” at the American Country Awards. In 2015 he was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame and in 2021 he was awarded the National Medal of the Arts.

In 2022 he announced he had stomach cancer and gave his final performance in Las Vegas in December 2023. He died in Oklahoma in his sleep in February 2024 when he was 62 years old.

Sources:

Keith, Toby (8th July 1961-5th February 2024)

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