NEW ARTIST SPOTLIGHT: Matt Stillwell

Matt Stillwell has figured it out. On his debut album, Shine, produced by Mickey Jack Cones and released by Still7 Records, he walks that line where the gritty and commercial sides of life intersect. These 10 tunes, half of them co-written by Stillwell, are suited equally for radio listening and dance-club partying. And this Sylva, N.C., native sings each one with a voice that sounds both young and experienced.

With his father in construction and his mother teaching school, Stillwell knew from the start that hard work was step one toward chasing your dreams. Although he loved Country Music, he began focusing his energy on sports as a high school senior. Baseball was his passion at Western Carolina University in Cullowhee, N.C., where he played on the Southern Conference-winning team. After graduation, Stillwell revisited his musical dreams, enrolled in the music business program at Belmont University and left after a semester to start playing solo acoustic gigs back home in Sylva, in Knoxville, Tenn., and eventually throughout the Southeast.

His talent blossomed quickly, as documented on Shine. The title song, a paean to moonshine and Mason jars (written by Stillwell and Lynn Hutton and released as the first single) captures the festive side of his music, with its foot-stomp beat, percolating banjo, sing-along hook and the crowd that comes in cheering on the last chorus. But when he makes the listener feel the anguish implicit in the title of "Damn This Rain" and closes with "Oh My Sweet Carolina," a touching tribute to his home state, it becomes clear that Stillwell covers all the bases and scores.

2009 CMA Close Up® News Service / Country Music Association®, Inc.