Corey Smith Page

At a time when most of the music industry is talking about creating a new business model and connecting more effectively with consumers, singer-songwriter Corey Smith is blazing trails in a brave new territory others have yet to explore.

With a catalogue of hard-hitting songs, a mesmerizing live performance, and an enormous internet presence, Smith is forging ahead with an independent, do-it-yourself attitude, and posting numbers that leave little room to doubt his success. He has sold more than 385,000 downloads since May 2006, over 110,000 of those on iTunes. He tours relentlessly and has sold out more than 80 shows since last year. He is consistently ranked as the #1 unsigned country artist on MySpace.com and is in the top 30 among artists of all genres, with more than 50,000 friends flocking to his site, enjoying more than 3 million plays of his music.

Corey Smith is obviously connecting with his audience, but it’s not marketing savvy that sells, it’s the music, and that’s where he truly shines. The Georgia native melds country, rock and blues into a sound that is all his own. That distinctive musical flair combined with Smith’s pensive, well-crafted lyrics and soulful Southern voice has earned him an enthusiastic legion of fans.

“I think it’s a little of everything,” says Smith in describing his innovative style. “We don’t live in cultural bubbles anymore. We’re all exposed to many different types of music through TV, radio, and now especially the internet. I like to think my songs reflect the variety of musical styles that have impacted my life in Georgia. Gospel, country, blues, rock, hip-hop – strands of all these are there.”

That diversity is especially evident on his newest project, Hard-Headed Fool. “The songs on it are very different from one another production-wise. I tried to incorporate a larger cross-section of my musical influences into this record, while addressing common themes, lyrically, to glue the songs together.”

The songs on his new album, Hard-Headed Fool, showcase a confident young artist in full command of his gift. Always a very visual songwriter, Smith’s lyrics have even greater depth and poignancy than before. The title track is about a man coming to terms with his choices in life. “It’s about learning from my mistakes, growing up, and becoming an adult,” says the man who has led many a rowdy crowd partying in the bars of North Georgia, but has struggled to tame his own wild streak. “Life’s about making our own decisions and facing the consequences. Sure, we’re all hard-headed. We’ve all done things that we knew we shouldn’t have done, and it seems like there is always a price to pay. But we don’t have to wear the past around like a heavy coat. The album, I think, is largely about that. It’s about being human. It’s about dealing with our selves and our mistakes and trying to turn them into something good.”

As the Internet has leveled the playing field in more ways than one, Smith has been the at the vanguard of the indie movement, utilizing MySpace and other tools to stay connected to his rapidly growing fan base. Smith says, “It really starts with a song. We haven’t created some magical formula. It’s just about writing songs that, for one reason or another, connect with people and impact their lives.”

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