1. Darius Carlos Rucker was born on May 13,1966 and is an American singer, musician, and songwriter.
52 Facts About Darius Rucker
1. 2.
Darius Rucker co-wrote most of the songs with the other members of the band.
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Six years later, Darius Rucker signed to Capitol Nashville as a country singer and released his second album, Learn to Live.
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Darius Rucker's father was in a gospel band called The Traveling Echoes.
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Darius Rucker has said that he had a typical Southern African-American upbringing.
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Darius Rucker's family attended church every Sunday and was economically poor; at one point, his mother, her two sisters, his grandmother and 14 children were all living in a three-bedroom house.
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Darius Rucker met fellow band members Mark Bryan, Jim "Soni" Sonefeld, and Dean Felber while attending the University of South Carolina.
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Darius Rucker received death threats for singing the Hootie song "Drowning," a protest song against the flying of the Confederate flag above the South Carolina statehouse.
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Shortly after gaining a measure of fame, Felber and Darius Rucker moved into an apartment in Columbia, South Carolina.
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Darius Rucker joined Nanci Griffith on the song "Gulf Coast Highway" for her 1997 album Blue Roses from the Moons, and sang backing vocals on Radney Foster's 1999 album See What You Want to See.
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Darius Rucker encouraged Atlantic Records to agree to a deal with Edwin McCain and made a guest appearance on McCain's debut album, Honor Among Thieves.
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Darius Rucker portrayed a singing cowboy in a television commercial for the fast-food company Burger King, promoting its TenderCrisp Bacon Cheddar Ranch sandwich in 2005.
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In 2006 Rucker lent his voice to the track "God's Reasons" written by Dean Dinning and Joel A Miller for the film The Still Life.
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In early 2008, Darius Rucker signed to Capitol Records Nashville as the beginning of a career in country music.
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On November 11,2009, Darius Rucker won the Country Music Association New Artist of the Year award, making him the first African American to do so since the award was introduced in 1981.
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Darius Rucker released his second country album, Charleston, SC 1966, on October 12,2010.
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On May 20,2011, Darius Rucker delivered the commencement address to the graduating class of the Medical University of South Carolina.
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On October 12,2012, Darius Rucker told Broadway's Electric Barnyard that his album would be titled True Believers.
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On October 2,2012, Darius Rucker was invited to join the Grand Ole Opry.
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Darius Rucker was a featured performer at the C2C: Country to Country festival in London on March 17,2013, which was headlined by Carrie Underwood.
21.
On May 11,2013, Darius Rucker was the speaker at the commencement ceremony for the University of South Carolina in Columbia.
22.
Darius Rucker sang the national anthem at the NBA finals on June 16,2013.
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At the awards ceremony on January 26,2014, Darius Rucker won, becoming only the third African American recording act to win a vocal performance Grammy Award in a country music category.
24.
On September 15,2014, it was announced that Darius Rucker had completed his first Christmas album and that it would be released on October 27,2014.
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May 30,2015, Darius Rucker headlined Philadelphia's famous XTU 31st Anniversary Show at the Susquehanna Bank Center.
26.
Darius Rucker makes an appearance on Sister Hazel's 2016 album, Lighter in the Dark.
27.
On January 6,2016, Darius Rucker announced that he was working on his fifth country album.
28.
Darius Rucker returned to the C2C: Country to Country festival in the UK in March 2017, where he was second on the bill to Reba McEntire.
29.
On May 29,2016, Darius Rucker performed the national anthem prior to the 100th running of the Indianapolis 500.
30.
Darius Rucker agreed to perform the song at the behest of personal friend and former Bills player Bruce Smith, whose jersey was being retired that night.
31.
Darius Rucker sang the national anthem again ahead of the Saints-Dolphins game held at London's Wembley Stadium in October 2017, as part of the NFL International Series.
32.
Darius Rucker appeared as a mentor on seventeenth season of The Voice for Team Blake.
33.
Darius Rucker released Beers and Sunshine in August 2020 under Capitol Records, and released a "summer mix" version of the song in 2021.
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In 2021, Darius Rucker contributed a cover of the Metallica song "Nothing Else Matters" to the charity tribute album The Metallica Blacklist.
35.
Darius Rucker released a new single titled "Same Beer Different Problems" in April 2022.
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Darius Rucker subsequently announced that his seventh solo album, Carolyn's Boy, named after his mother, would be released in 2023.
37.
Darius Rucker featured on the single "To Be a Man" by Dax in October 2023.
38.
On November 7,2016, Darius Rucker told ESPN that he had become a partner in MGC Sports, a sports agency that currently represents golfers, football players, and coaches.
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Darius Rucker added that he was planning to reduce his performance commitments from 100 dates per year to about 30, and that he thought his experience in the entertainment business would be an asset to potential clients.
40.
Darius Rucker will be able to work without restrictions for golfers, but because he is not registered with the NFL players' union, he initially will only be able to meet with NFL players under very limited circumstances.
41.
Darius Rucker is an ardent South Carolina Gamecocks fan as well as a Miami Dolphins and Cincinnati Reds fan.
42.
Darius Rucker's mother died in November 1992 of a heart attack.
43.
The Hootie song "Where Were You" is about Darius Rucker's strained relationship with his father, and was released only in Europe, where Darius Rucker thought that his father would be unlikely to hear it.
44.
Darius Rucker is a friend of golfer Tiger Woods, whom he met in a bar in 1993 when Woods was 18.
45.
Darius Rucker's interest in golf goes well beyond his relationship with Woods; he was a VIP guest of Team USA at the 2016 Ryder Cup, and he attended Arnold Palmer's funeral shortly before the Cup.
46.
On February 1,2024, Darius Rucker was arrested in Williamson County, Tennessee on two misdemeanor drug charges and one misdemeanor vehicle registration violation.
47.
On January 29,2025, Darius Rucker revealed in an Instagram post that he would be relocating to London, England, to tour more frequently around the United Kingdom, and work on new creative endeavors.
48.
Darius Rucker has no plans to renounce his US citizenship.
49.
Darius Rucker serves as a board member of the MUSC Shawn Jenkins Children's Hospital in Charleston, where his mother worked for over thirty years from the time Rucker was a child, and has helped raise millions of dollars to help build a new hospital.
50.
Darius Rucker made a commitment to support St Jude Children's Research Hospital after touring the facility in 2008.
51.
Since then, Darius Rucker has spearheaded an annual event resulting in over $1.6 million raised for St Jude's to date.
52.
In November 2023, it was announced that Darius Rucker would get a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.