The Zac Brown Band all started off with a restaurant owner dreaming about a music career. During his college days, Zac Brown, a native of Cumming, Georgia, formed a band, but they disbanded before the album was recorded. The disaster of September 11, 2001 inspired him to follow music, because life was too limited to do anything that he did not love.
In 2002, along with bassist John Hopkins and fiddler Jimmy De Martini, he founded the Zac Brown Unit. Only a year back, they also started their own label, naming it Home Grown. Brown sold his Lake Oconee, Georgia, restaurant in 2004 to acquire a tour bus. Brown was traveling full-time, visiting venues and festivals together with his band. In the same year, an independent album named “Far From Einstyne” was released.
The line-up became bigger when violin/fiddle player and harmony singer Jimmy De Martini were introduced to the Zac Brown Team. The second independent album under the label “Home Grown” was released in 200With the inclusion of John Driskell Hopkins on bass, their band expanded once more. Coy Bowles, an associate of Brown University, quit his band to become a full-time member of the Zac Brown Band, and Chris Fryar joined the band as a guitarist.
The band was signed to Live Nation Artist Records in 2008 but the company closed, causing Atlantic Records to overtake the distribution of the “Chicken Fried” single from the band. Their major break came that year when they launched the album “The Foundation” In addition to peaking at number 2 on the Billboard Hot Country chart, the album was also double platinum certified in the U.S.
In 2009, four nominations for the 2009 CMA Awards were won by the band: New Artist of the Year, Album of the Year, Single of the Year, and Chicken Fried Music Video of the Year. Grammy awards for Best Country Song, Best Country Performance By a Duo or Group Of Vocals and Best New Artist persisted with the accolade. They received the Grammy award for Best New Artist in 2010.
