Parmalee - 2012 in Review

2012 has been a great year for Matt Thomas, Barry Knox, Josh McSwain and Scott Thomas, the exceptional country rock band also known as "Parmalee."  With the new year just a few days away, this is a good time to look back on the past year.  Whether you were here for all or just part of the ride, you can be sure of one thing.  As great as this year has been, the new year - with a new single and new CD - promises to be even better.

Parmalee's first single on Stoney Creek Records was released on February 21, 2012.  The song, "Musta Had a Good Time," became an instant hit on satellite radio, sitting at Number 1 on The Highway Country for four consecutive weeks before spreading across terrestrial radio. It became a regular on daily fan-voted countdown shows from coast to coast, hitting Number 1 on stations from North Carolina to California. The song has a five star rating on iTunes and became the band's first song to hit the Top 40 on the country music charts.

In April, the band shot the music video for MHGT.  The video shoot took place at Deep South The Bar in Greenville, NC, on April 27th, and locals were invited to take part.  Since its release, the video has been a staple on the CMT Pure 12-Pack Countdown, where it hit Number 1on its twelfth consecutive week on the show.  The video was world premiered on AOL's The Boot on August, 29th, with an article featuring the Top 5 moments from the video shoot published the preceding day.

In June, Parmalee was featured as a Billboard "Bubbling Under" artist, was one of Clear Channel's NEW! Artist to Watch, and saw their party anthem MHGT listed among CountryMusicIsLove.com's Top 15 Songs of Summer.  The next month, the band was on Fox Nashville's "Tennessee Mornings" show.  The band was interviewed and played two songs, including an acoustic version of "Carolina."

Parmalee played at various industry events throughout the year.  In October, they played the International Entertainment Buyers Association Conference.  Later that month, they played the 3rd annual BBR Pre-CMA party at the Hard Rock in Nashville.

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 In November, they attended the Country Music Association awards show and were interviewed by some country radio stations and media sites beforehand.

In its October 8th issue, Country Weekly introduced its readers to the band in a great article, aptly entitled, "Introducing Parmalee."  There was also a companion video interview with the band which was released in September on Country Weekly's website here.  Later in the year, Billboard.com's Chuck Dauphin shined "The 615 Spotlight" on the band in a December feature article, entitled, "Parmalee Thriving Two Years After Near-Tragedy." 

Throughout the year, the band played at a variety of concert venues including music festivals, bars, clubs, and various radio stations around the country. They visited with KFrog in Riverside,  103.5 FM in Tampa, WQIK in Jacksonville, Hank FM in Indiana, 102.5 KNIX in Phoenix, 93.7 the Bull in St. Louis, among other stations.  Here's a clip of them playing "Can't Tell My Heart What to Do" in October, at a show sponsored by Bakersfield country station KUZZ:

The band also played four Stage It shows, one a month starting in September.  The first show was "live from the tour bus," the second was "help Parmalee pick the songs for the album," the third was "songs they were thankful for," and the fourth was "live from the studio" where the band is currently laying down tracks for their upcoming album.  Each of the four songs garnered a large audience of enthusiastic fans enjoying some familiar favorites while being introduced to some new songs.

During the third Stage It show, Matt announced the news that their next single would be "Carolina" and that it would be released on February 4, 2013.  They have been working on their debut for Stoney Creek Records, which is expected out the first half of 2013.  Some of the songs that might make the album were played during the December Stage It show, which you can read about here.

As 2012 comes to a close, Parmalee's concert calendar is starting to fill up for next year. They've already been announced as part of a number of major country music festivals as well as headlining their own "Country Gone Wild" Tour with Bush Hawg and Zach Lockwood.  They will finish the album they're currently working with producers New Voice Entertainment.

In December, Roughstock.com included Parmalee among their annual year-end list of new artists to watch in the coming year.  In the article, 13 for 13: Ones to Watch, Roughstock said of Parmalee, "Parmalee's First Top 40 single "Musta Had A Good Time" announced their arrival. Look for "Carolina" to make them stars." 

That's the best way to sum up this year, as we look towards the new one.