The world of entertainment isn't always a friendly one. As a performer, you take a big risk when you put yourself out there because sometimes, even the most talented people are looked over. Here we list those who weren't looked over, the ones who went on to become stars and made country music as we know it today!
Meet country music's biggest names, and learn a little bit more about where and when they started out. We share pictures of your favorite country stars from the beginning of their careers to where they are now with tons of earnings, and we take a look at a little bit of what they've achieved during their professional years.
Taylor Swift, 33
It was in 2006 that Taylor Swift introduced her talent to the world through the debut of her album titled Taylor Swift. Her hit single, Our Song, hit the Billboard Hot Country Songs list, ranking first place, two months before the talented star turned 17!
She was launched to fame and affluence with her country music debut before she became a superstar in the pop genre. In 2017, Swift released Reputation, while her seventh studio album titled Lover is scheduled for release in August 2019. Fans are looking forward to the video of You Need to Calm Down which will be available to the public in June 2019.
Luke Bryan, 46
Luke Bryan has been sipping from the fountain of youth, it seems – and so this may be a clue that it is hidden somewhere in Nashville! In 2007, Bryan released his debut album called I’ll Stay Me and we must say that since then, he has done a good job of staying the same!
Bryan took Caroline Boyer as his bride, after meeting her at a local bar at the time that he was a student of Georgia Southern University. They tied the knot in 2006 and had two boys together, named Tatum and Thomas. In 2017, he was announced as a member of the judging panel of American Idol.
Keith Urban, 55
New Zealand native Keith Urban is barely recognizable from this picture back in 1993, with that long blonde hair! While we aren’t saying he looks older, he simply has changed a lot! It was in 1989 that Urban left New Zealand to start a life and a career in the US, and he became the lead singer of The Ranch.
Shortly after his debut album in 1997, Urban went solo with Keith II and his venture on his own proved successful indeed. During his music career, he’s released nine studio albums, one of which has been restricted to Australia alone. He is married to actress Nicole Kidman.
Carrie Underwood, 40
In 2005, Carrie Underwood blew away audiences with her rich vocals on American Idol’s fourth season. Ultimately, Underwood bagged the show’s first prize and her music career kicked off. Her debut album was titled Some Hearts, released that same year. Underwood became a country music star.
In her personal life, Underwood scored when she met and dated Mike Fisher, and NHL star player, and married him in 2010 in Georgia among 250 guests. The couple had their first son in February 2015, and their second in January 2019. They purchased a deluxe house in Ottawa resting on 11 acres in 2010.
Billy Ray Cyrus, 61
Billy Ray Cyrus may be famous for his mullet back in the days, but he wasn’t the only star to have sported one in the ‘90s. But this is what he is recognized for, and he's worn it well. He is better known for Achy Breaky Heart, a hit single that became the first to achieve triple Platinum status in the history of music in Australia.
Billy Ray Cyrus’ career as a musician has been immensely successful, with him releasing 12 studio albums and 44 single since his debut in 1992. In his portfolio, the most successful album by Cyrus is Some Gave All, certified 9x Platinum in the US.
Willie Nelson, 90
Willie Nelson is known for his love of long hair and bandanas, and for sporting a country-casual style about his appearance. But he’s come a long way from what he looked like at the start of his music career! His clean-cut look back in the ‘60s doesn’t resemble him at all as what we know him today.
Since those days of his debut album titled …And then I Wrote, Nelson has grown to be one of the world’s most beloved country musicians in history. He has released a staggering 67 studio albums and sold over 40 million copies in the US alone!
Alison Krauss, 51
Gone are the days when Alison Krauss sported brunette curls, back in the late ‘80s when she was a rising star! She is now blonde and immensely successful, having released 14 albums and bagged 27 Grammy Awards since back then! She is the most awarded singer and female artist in the history of the Grammy Awards!
In spite of her several awards, her only number one hit was in 2000, called Buy Me a Rose. Between 1997 and 2001, Krauss married musician, Pat Bergeson. The couple became parents to a son in July of 1999 and named him Sam. It was reported that she was in a romance with John Waite, but now, she is currently unattached.
Florida Georgia Line, in their 30s
The year 2012 marked the time when Florida Georgia Line released their debut studio album called Here’s to the Good Times. The album skyrocketed to No. 1 on the country charts and so did their three follow-up albums, much to their success. In February 2019, they released their fourth studio album, Can’t Say I Ain’t Country.
Brian Kelley and Tyler Hubbard have come a long way since they first started out – and not just professionally! In their personal lives, they are both husbands and fathers now. Kelley got hitched in 2013 to his girlfriend of seven months – Brittney Marie Cole while Hubbard had his wedding to long-time love Hayley Stommel in 2015.
Dierks Bentley, 47
Dierks Bentley's debut album was Don’t Leave Me In Love and it was released in 2001. The album was so poorly received that it failed to make money! However, as determined as Bentley was, he signed with Capitol Records and in 2003 released a major-label debut in the form of a self-titled album, which included his first hit single.
Including his self-titled album, he’s released nine studio albums and has received a number of awards from the Grammy Award and from several others for his impressive music. In 2018, he released The Mountain and of the 13 songs that featured in the album, 10 of them were written by Bentley himself.
Garth Brooks, 61
Hungry Years was Garth Brooks’ first album, released in 1986. The debut album was followed by Brooks’ first major-label studio album three years later, titled Garth Brooks. The self-titled album hit No. 2 on the Top Country Albums chart and Brooks’ career was on a roll.
In October 2000, Brooks made the shocking announcement that disappointed his fans – he announced his retirement from his music career in order to put more focus on his family. He was married to Sandy Mahl at the time, and they divorced in 2001. He married Trisha Yearwood in 2005 and began touring again in 2014.
Trisha Yearwood, 58
Trisha Yearwood is one of Nashville’s sweethearts – she is among Nashville’s biggest stars since 1991. She introduced herself with a self-titled album and produced a genre-crossing hit single that created quite a stir called She’s In Love With the Boy. About three decades and three Grammys along the line, in 2019, Yearwood remains a country music favorite.
In 2019, it has been announced that Trisha will be hitting the road with a solo tour – her first in five years! She is a lovely Southern wife and famous mother, and so you can imagine that food and family are rather important to Trisha. But she still looks fabulous and is aging gracefully!
Blake Shelton, 46
Long before Blake Shelton’s days as a country star, or even as a member of the judging panel of The Voice, he had a bad-cowboy persona about him, as can be seen in his picture from way-back-when. He released his self-titled album back in 2001 and it went platinum.
Being launched into superstar status means you end up rubbing shoulders with other superstars. When Shelton signed up as a judge on The Voice, he didn’t expect to find love with Gwen Stefani on set. The lovebirds attended the 2019 Met Gala and had heads turning! No news of an engagement yet though...
Miranda Lambert, 39
Miranda Lambert’s debut album was released in 2001 but even if it was a self-titled album, her name only got some real recognition and attention in 2003 after she placed third place in that year’s Nashville Star TV show. She also snagged a lucrative Sony Records contract!
Beyond her solo career, Lambert happens to also be a member of Pistol Annies with Ashley Monroe and Angaleena Presley. Lambert was also honored by the Academy of Country Music Awards, the Grammy Awards, and the Country Music Association Awards. She made her first performances outside Canada and the US in 2016. She and Blake Shelton got a divorce in 2015 after four years of marriage.
Emmylou Harris, 76
Emmylou Harris released Gliding Bird over five decades ago, and since that impressive debut album, she had received 13 Grammy awards, the Polar Music Prize, and a number of other awards. She has been inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame as well and received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2018.
These days, Harris is all about carrying off the Bohemian look with the vibrancy and ease that only she can accomplish! This snap is from the ‘70s, and while her hair color is now a shade of silver rather than brunette, she is a natural beauty both in her musical talent as well as in appearance!
Jake Owen, 41
Jake Owen’s long shaggy locks were cropped, changing his look entirely, and we quite like the hairstyle! As he climbed the ladder to stardom in country music, he altered his appearance. Now, he looks like the star that he is! The picture on the left was from around 2006, about the time of his first album release.
Since his debut, Owen has established himself as a chart-topping singer and has released four albums. His first three albums were with RCA Nashville, who he signed up with in 2006, but as of November 2017, he left RCA for Big Loud Records. He released Greetings From… Jake as his first album with the label, and his fourth in his career.
Maren Morris, 33
Maren Morris was simply an adorable and innocent-looking teen when she first hit the country music scene in 2005! She was an underground artist for years, until 2016, Hero was dropped. It was her first major-label album release and she gained critical acclaim and more mainstream success as a result of the album.
Her 2015 extended play titled Maren Morris charted on two Billboard charts. Hero had her ranking number five on the Billboard 200 chart and first place on the Top Country Albums chart. After Hero, in 2016, Morris released Girl in 2019. She became the bride of Ryan Hurd in March 2018, in Tennessee.
Ryan Hurd, 36
Ryan Hurd is a new kid on the block, in some way or the other, as his first single was released n 2017 called We Do Us. The single has generated over 2 million streams on Spotify, which speaks for its success! He's a songwriter-turned-singer, and we bet he’s glad he's taken up singing by the looks of his growing success and net worth!
The picture on the left isn’t all that old – it was taken in 2015. But it’s clear that since then, Ryan Hurd has chopped his long locks and has upgraded is appearance. Hurd married Maren Morris, another country music star singer, record producer, and songwriter, in 2018.
Kacey Musgraves, 34
Kacey Musgraves made herself known in the underground country genre in 2002, with the release of her debut album she called Movin’ On. In 2007, Musgraves appeared as a contestant on the popular TV show, Nashville Star, and while she didn’t bag the winning title, her appearance helped her gain momentum in her career. It also led her to win two Grammy’s and gain mainstream success.
As far as her private life is concerned, Musgraves revealed in 2014 through ABC Radio that she was in a relationship with Misa Arriaga, her bandmate, for several years. Then came Musgraves' romance with Ruston Kelly, whom she met at Nashville’s Bluebird Café. They had their wedding in 2017.
Brett Eldredge, 37
Brett Eldredge is a huge star in the genre of country music and sometimes, it is easy to forget that he’s actually only been around for a couple of years. In his short career, he has managed to find massive success and rather rapidly at that – he’s dropped not just one, but two No. 1 albums and a number of hit singles.
Eldredge looks incredibly different in these two pictures but the one on the left is a photograph of him three years before his 2013 debut studio album, Bring You Back. These days, he isn’t baby-faced anymore but he’s taken on a more rugged look, which we think suits him quite well!
Reba McEntire, 68
Reba McEntire is a familiar face in the country music genre and she has been around for an exceedingly long time. Her debut album was, like a lot of other artists’, self-titled and was released in 1977. The album was initially considered a flop but she was determined to make her career work.
Come 1979, McEntire released Out of a Dream, her sophomore album. The album included her first hit single called Last Night, Ev’ry Night. She has since come a very long way and established a powerful career, which has granted her a net worth of $95 million to date. In 2019, she released the album titled Stronger Than the Truth.
LeAnn Rimes, 40
LeAnn Rimes wasn’t even 14 yet when she had her debut studio album dropped. The album, titled Blue, was the first of several to come to the about-to-be star! It was in 1996 that her debut album was released but she had released three independent albums by then, too.
LeAnn Rimes has come a long way from being the youngest country music star since Tanya Tucker. She has revealed her lifelong challenge with psoriasis and has been helping raise awareness about the condition. She was married to Dean Shermet until 2009 when they divorced because of Rimes’ extramarital affair with her now husband, actor Eddie Cibrian.
Tanya Tucker, 64
Tanya Tucker had her debut in 1972, with the song Delta Dawn at just 13 years old. Amazingly, her first album was actually released around her 14th birthday! She then became one of the few performers to have managed to carry their fans into their adulthood career. She then saw a streak of Top 40 and Top 10 hits, making money out of it.
Tucker founded her own record label, Tuckertime Records, in 2002 which allowed her to control the recording process and also release the singles she only liked. That same year, she issued her first album in five years, titled Tanya. Tucker has dated several famous men but has never been married.
Alan Jackson, 64
Alan Jackson looks pretty much the same since his first album release (Here in the Real World) about three decades ago, except for the fact that he has aged quite a bit since (see the creases and grey hair!). He is a hearty country singer who has built a huge fan base over the years of his career in music.
Jackson is widely considered one of the best singers in the country genre in the history of music. He has grabbed two Grammy awards for himself and countless ACM and CMA awards. He has sold over 80 million records, which speaks volumes for how famous he actually is!
Brad Paisley, 50
Brad Paisley released his debut studio album in 1999 and it was called Who Needs Pictures. The album featured his first two hit singles We Danced and He Didn’t Have to Be. During his career, Paisley has sold more than 11 million copies of his albums and has taken away three Grammy awards and 14 Academy of Country Music Awards and many, many more!
Two decades after his debut, Brad is a successful country music artist and is very happily married to Kimberley Williams Paisley. He is typically known for his love songs, which he sings with his lovely wife in mind. He has a net worth of $95 million as of 2019.
Chris Stapleton, 45
Chris Stapleton actually looks pretty much as he does in the photo on the left if perhaps a little like he’s lost some weight. He gained recognition when he was the frontman of The Steeldrivers, back in 2007. His success has certainly grown since then and today is a highly acclaimed solo artist.
Stapleton is the proud receiver of several awards, including the prestigious Grammy Award, which he has won five of, and several ACM awards and CMA awards. He has two hit album releases and is still continuing to grow in the industry. Stapelton is married to Morgane Stapleton, and they are parents to four children and reside in Nashville.
Toby Keith, 61
Toby Keith lost the mullet he sported, but he hasn’t lost the talent that made him famous with it! Back in 1993, he was quite a sensation and it was the year he released his first studio album. He has released several more since and two Christmas albums and a number of compilation albums.
Keith actually has an honorary degree from Villanova University, which he attended in the hopes of becoming a petroleum engineer. He married Tricia Lucus in 1984 and they have a family of three children, two biological and one adopted. He is also the grandfather of two girls and a boy.
Kenny Chesney, 55
Now, it is obvious that these two pictures are at totally different stages in Kenney Chesney’s life. The first is at the beginning of his singing career when he was very young and the other is him currently with years of wisdom behind him! He has retained his handsome boyishness (albeit the thinning hair) but in a masculine way.
Chesney’s debut album was titled In My Wildest Dreams and it didn’t land him anywhere near the top of the chart, but it brought about his two hit singles – The Tin Man and Whatever It Takes. He re-recorded The Tin Man for his Greatest Hits album in 2000.
Faith Hill, 55
Faith Hill debuted her first album at age 26 in October 1993, called Take Me as I Am. Her perfectly coiffed curls were attractive but what got more attention was her talented vocal skills! She looks pretty much the same as she did all those years ago and boy, are we impressed!
Faith was first married to publishing executive Daniel Hill, but their marriage ended in divorce in 1994. It was when Hill was singing to herself on an ordinary day that a co-worker heard her and encouraged her to become the firm’s demo-singer. Before she knew it, she had gained some momentum in her music career. In 1996, she married country singer Tim McGraw.
Tim McGraw, 56
There is no doubt about it - Tim McGraw is a hunk! Just check out these pictures and they speak for themselves! Back in 1993, he started out with a debut album but the self-titled album was actually a flop. But it was in 1994 that his career changed.
McGraw released his second album called Not a Moment Too Soon, hitting No. 1 on the Billboard 200! Well, the star country singer may be a hunk but he is off the table for good. As we've mentioned, he’s happily married to country singer Faith Hill, and together, they enjoy a ridiculously successful career both in film and music. That explains their $135 million joint bank account!
George Strait, 70
George Strait is practically a legend in the world of country music! He released his debut studio album all the way back in 1981, cleverly called Strait Country. The album landed him on the Billboard Top Country Albums chart, sitting on No. 26! Not at all bad for a debut!
His current look is that of a cowboy with salt-and-pepper mane, but he is still a heartthrob in spite of his many years! In fact, in 2012, he announced his retirement from touring and what would be his last tour, Cowboy Rides Away, sold out in mere hours!
Martina McBride, 56
Crossover country-pop pioneer, Martina McBride, dropped her debut album in 1992, titled The Time Has Come. She boasts 13 studio albums and two greatest hits compilations. She has sold over 14 million albums in the US and has been nominated for a Grammy 14 times!
In 1988, Martina became the bride of John McBride, a sound engineer. They have three daughters together named Delaney Katharine, Emma Justine, and Ava Rose Kathleen. After Martina McBride became a mom, her touring schedule was cut short to dedicate her time to the upbringing of her children.
Darius Rucker, 56
Darius Rucker was once recognized for being the lead singer of the band by the name of Hootie and the Blowfish. At that time, he wasn’t known for country music, but this all changed in 2008 after he parted ways with the band and released a country album called Learn to Live.
The album went platinum (with earnings to match) and to this day, it remains Rucker’s best-selling album in his career. Rucker met Tiger Woods in a bar when he was 18 and the two became good friends afterward. In 2016, Rucker became a partner in MGC Sports, as he shared with ESPN.
Kenny Rogers, 80
Singer/songwriter, record producer, actor, and entrepreneur Kenny Rogers is a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame. If you’re wondering why these pictures of the iconic Kenny Rogers look so different, let us assure you that it isn’t only because one is from the ‘70s and the other more recent!
Yes, the all-white mane and beard have had an effect on his appearance, making him look a lot different, but it was eye surgery in 2006 that really changed Rogers’ look! He shared that he regretted having it done, though it was done to eliminate some wrinkles around the eye and ended up being too tight and unnatural!