Bradley Douglas Paisley (born October 28, 1972) is an American country music singer, songwriter, and guitarist. Starting with his 1999 debut album Who Needs Pictures, he has released eleven studio albums and a Christmas compilation on the Arista Nashville label, with all of his albums certified Gold or higher by the RIAA. He has scored 35 Top 10 singles on the US Billboard Country Airplay chart, 20 of which have reached number one. He set a new record in 2009 for the most consecutive singles (10) reaching the top spot on that chart. Paisley has sold over 11 million albums and has won three Grammy Awards, 14 Academy of Country Music Awards, 14 Country Music Association Awards, and two American Music Awards. He has also earned country music's crowning achievement, becoming a member of the Grand Ole Opry. Paisley also wrote songs for Pixar's Cars franchise ("Behind the Clouds", "Find Yourself", "Collision of Worlds" with Robbie Williams, "Nobody's Fool", etc.). Early life Paisley was born and raised in Glen Dale, West Virginia. He is the only child of Douglas Edward "Doug" Paisley, who worked for the West Virginia Department of Transportation, and Sandra Jean "Sandy" (née Jarvis) Paisley, a teacher. He has stated that his love of country music stems from his maternal grandfather, Warren Jarvis, who gave him his first guitar, a Sears Danelectro Silvertone, and taught him how to play at eight years old. In third grade, he performed for the first time in public by singing in his church. Initially, they were just going to have him play the song on the guitar instead of a piano. But then the adults heard him sing the tune and said, "forget the choir, let's just have Brad do the whole thing." After that, he never had to ask for a gig until he left Glen Dale. He later recalled that "Pretty soon, I was performing at every Christmas party and Mother's Day event. The neat thing about a small town is that when you want to be an artist, by golly, they'll make you one." At age 13, he wrote his first song, "Born on Christmas Day", which later appeared on his album Brad Paisley Christmas. He had been taking lessons with local guitarist Clarence "Hank" Goddard. By 13, Goddard and Paisley formed a band called "Brad Paisley and the C-Notes", with the addition of two of Paisley's adult