Chris Gaines
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| Chris Gaines | |
|---|---|
| Origin | Brisbane, Australia (fictitiously) |
| Genre(s) | Alternative rock Rock |
| Years active | 1999 |
| Label(s) | Capitol |
| Associated acts | Garth Brooks |
Chris Gaines is a fictional alternative rock singer created as an alter ego for a movie project titled The Lamb by Garth Brooks. Brooks assumed the Chris Gaines personality in 1999, recording one album under the name and charting three singles on the Billboard charts, including the Top 5 pop hit "Lost in You."
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[edit] History
Chris Gaines began in 1994 when Brooks, attempting to expand his career boundaries, collaborated with his production company Red Strokes Entertainment and Paramount Pictures to develop a movie Brooks was meant to star in as Chris Gaines. The Lamb was to have revolved around Chris Gaines, a fictional rock singer and his emotionally conflicted life as a musician in the public eye. To create buzz for the project, Brooks took on the Gaines identity in the October 1999 album Garth Brooks in ... The Life of Chris Gaines, which was intended as a 'pre-soundtrack' to the film. Brooks also subsequently appeared as Chris Gaines in a television mockumentary for the VH1 series Behind The Music and as the musical guest on an episode of Saturday Night Live which Brooks hosted as himself.
Brooks' endless promotion of the album and the film did not seem to stir much excitement and the failure of the Chris Gaines experiment became fairly evident mere weeks after the album was released. Although critics admired Brooks for taking a musical risk, the majority of the American public was either totally bewildered or completely unreceptive to the idea of Garth Brooks as anything but a pop-country singer. Many of his fans also felt that by supporting the Gaines project they would lose the "real" Garth Brooks. Sales of the album were unspectacular and although it made it to #2 on the pop album chart, expectations had been higher and retail stores began heavily discounting their oversupply. Poor sales of the album and lack of interest in the film brought the film production to an indefinite hiatus in February 2001 and Chris Gaines quickly and quietly faded into obscurity.
The opening night of Brooks' November 2007 nine-concert stand at the Sprint Center in Kansas City was "protested" by a local group of performance artists handing out "Missing Person" flyers for Gaines as a part of "The Chris Gaines Initiative."[1]
Despite the failure of the Chris Gaines project, Brooks gained his first - and only - US Top 40 pop single in "Lost in You", the first single from the album.
[edit] Fictional biography
Christian Gaines was born 10 August 1967 in Brisbane, Australia to an Olympic swimmer and her coach. He dropped out of high school to form a band called Crush, which released their sole hit, "My Love Tells Me So." After the lead singer died in a plane crash, Gaines went dormant for several years before releasing his first solo album, Straight Jacket, which remained in the Billboard 200 chart for 82 weeks and won four Grammys. Gaines then was involved in a serious car accident in 1992 and required numerous plastic surgeries. He remained reclusive until the release of his last studio album Triangle in 1996.
[edit] See also
- Garth Brooks as Chris Gaines - history of the Chris Gaines project
- Garth Brooks in ... The Life of Chris Gaines - album from the Chris Gaines project
[edit] External links
- The Official Chris Gaines Guitar custom made by Fender
- The Chris Gaines Initiative
- The Official Myspace of Chris Gaines
[edit] References
- [1]USA Today: Kansas City crowd welcomes Brooks back to the stage
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