A country artist with an agile voice, a gift for songwriting, and a passionate performing style,
David Nail emerged in 2002 with the moderately successful single "Memphis." He inked a deal with MCA Nashville five years later and released a string of high-charting studio albums, including 2011's
Sound of a Million Dreams, which featured the number one single "Let It Rain." In 2018 he teamed up with longtime colleagues Jason Hall and
Andrew Petroff under the moniker David Nail & The Well Ravens and issued the organic and inward-looking EP Only This and Nothing More. Two years later, he released the intimate Bootheel 2020 EP, which like its 2021 follow-up of the same name, paid tribute to his small Missouri hometown.
David Nail was born in Kennett, Missouri on May 18, 1979. Music was a major part of the
Nail household -- his father was a high school band director proficient on a number of instruments, and his mother sang in the church choir. His parents had an extensive and eclectic record collection, but country music wasn't on
Nail's radar until he was 14 and attended a school talent show. One of the entrants sang a version of
Travis Tritt's "Anymore," and
Nail was so taken with the song he immediately asked his folks to buy him a copy of
Tritt's recording. In high school,
Nail sang in the school's choir, appeared in local talent shows, and began writing songs, but he was also a fine baseball player with a .385 batting average, and he was accepted at Aquinas College on a sports scholarship. However, a shoulder injury ended his baseball career during his first college season, and
Nail returned home to sort out his options. He resumed his education at Arkansas State University, but when he was 20, he spent a few days in Nashville and was inspired to take another shot at a career in music. He moved to Music City, concentrated on his songwriting, and was playing a few songs at a party when, as luck would have it, he was heard by the daughter of record producer
Keith Stegall. She told her father that
Nail was a talent worth hearing, and before long the singer and songwriter was signed to a contract with Mercury Records.
In 2002,
Nail released his first single, "Memphis," but while the tune made it onto the Country Singles charts, Mercury opted not to release the album he recorded for them, and he was soon without a record deal. After a few years of coaching baseball,
Nail took another shot at Nashville, and once again found a champion in the form of a record producer, this time
Frank Liddell.
Liddell helped
Nail score a new deal with MCA Nashville, and in 2008,
Nail's first MCA single, "I'm About to Come Alive," was released. It fared slightly better than "Memphis," but it was his next release that changed the game for
Nail. Released in February 2009, "Red Light" peaked at number seven on the country singles charts and earned
Nail a gold record. The success of the single led to
Nail cutting an album for MCA, and this time, 2009's
I'm About to Come Alive was deemed worthy of release, rising to number 19 on the country album charts. In February 2011,
Nail released "Let It Rain," which became his first tune to become a number one country single; the album
The Sound of a Million Dreams followed several months later, and reached the Top Ten of the Country Albums chart. 2012 saw the release of a three-song EP,
1979, which included a cover of
Adele's "Someone Like You." 2013 brought
Nail another massive hit single, "Whatever She's Got," which earned him a platinum sales award. It was the first single released from
Nail's third MCA album, 2014's
I'm a Fire, which reached number three on the country album listings.
In July 2015,
Nail dropped a new single, "Nights on Fire," which was intended to be a preview of his upcoming album. However,
Nail opted to postpone the release of the LP as he added new songs to the sequence. He released a stopgap EP,
Uncovered, in May 2016, which featured interpretations of songs by
Elvis Presley,
Phil Collins,
Adele, and
the Weeknd, as well as a new version of his own "Looking for a Good Time." In July 2016,
Nail finally brought out
Fighter, an ambitious and personal work in which he sang of issues in his own life for the first time, including his battle with depression, his relationship with his father, and the struggles he and his wife went through to have a baby.
Fighter peaked at three on Billboard's country charts but it was his last album for MCA Nashville; he parted ways with the label in early 2017. The following year,
Nail unveiled a new backing band called the Well Ravens. Only This and Nothing More, his first album with the Well Ravens, appeared in September 2018. Shifting his focus to his Missouri hometown,
Nail issued the intimate EPs Bootheel 2020 and Bootheel 2021. ~ Mark Deming