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Waylon Albright " Shooter" Jennings (born May 19, 1979) is an American musician and record producer. He is the son of Country music singers Waylon Jennings and Jessi Colter. In a career spanning three decades, Jennings has explored a variety of musical genres.
Jennings made his debut with the single "4th of July" of his 2005 album Put the "O" Back in Country on Universal South, which peaked at No. 22 on the Billboard country charts. Jennings has since followed with seven full-length studio albums: Electric Rodeo (2006), The Wolf (2007), Black Ribbons (2009), Family Man (2012), The Other Life (2013) Countach (For Giorgio) (2016), and Shooter (2018), in addition to a live album, a compilation, and numerous Extended play.
He lived the first few years of his life in a crib on his parents' tour bus surrounded by the likes of Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson and Kris Kristofferson. By age 5, he was playing drums. At 8 years old, he began taking piano lessons. He started playing guitar at 14 and on occasion he'd play percussion in his father's band.
In high school Jennings fronted an industrial rock band called KilRaven for his high school's talent show. In 2011, he released the KilRaven track "Only You" on the album "Missed The Boat".
In 1996, Jennings and his father recorded an album together. They called it Fenixon (a play on the words "phoenix" and "son") but could not find a label to distribute it. Some of the material was remastered and used for the album Waylon Forever. The full Fenixon recording was finally released by Jennings's label Black Country Rock in 2014. Shooter Jennings is the uncle of singer Whey Jennings and musician William Harness, known as Struggle Jennings.
In 2002, Stargunn was featured on I've Always Been Crazy: A Tribute to Waylon Jennings, and the soundtrack to the Vince Vaughn film Made. Shortly after, Touchstone Pictures licensed the song "White Lines N Black Ties" for the film The Crew starring Burt Reynolds. Stargunn performed together for three years, built an avid following, and earned praise from the local music press. On March 30, 2003, Jennings dissolved Stargunn and began working on his solo career.
After the band's breakup, Jennings was twice presented with the opportunity to front the hard rock supergroup Velvet Revolver, but chose instead to pursue a solo career.
In 2015, Jennings's label Black Country Rock released Stargunn's debut album "The Only Way Up Is Down" on vinyl as part of Record Store Day.
"Put the "O" Back in Country" produced his only entry on the Billboard Hot Country Songs charts in its lead-off single "Fourth of July", which peaked at No. 22. The album version of this song features a cameo appearance by George Jones, who sings the chorus to his signature song "He Stopped Loving Her Today" at the end; this guest appearance was removed from the song's radio edit. Despite the edit, Jones was credited on the Billboard charts. The album featured his new band The .357's, which consisted of Leroy Powell on guitar, Bryan Keeling on drums, Ted Kamp on bass with Robby Turner on steel, and backing vocals by Bonnie Bramlett.
Later that year his song "Busted In Baylor County" was then featured in the 2005 film version of The Dukes of Hazzard, furthermore Jennings portrayed his father in the Johnny Cash biopic Walk the Line alongside Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon. His rendition of his father's song "Long Way From Home" was featured on the film's soundtrack.
Electric Rodeo was followed by The Wolf on October 23, 2007. The album varied from his previous records in that the .357s had opted for a decidedly 1970s feel to the instrumentals. It featured collaborations with Doug Kershaw and The Oak Ridge Boys, as well as a cover of the Dire Straits song "Walk of Life".
That same year Jennings was featured on a duet of "Good Hearted Woman" on Deana Carter's sixth studio album, The Chain.
After the release of Bad Magick: The Best of Shooter Jennings and the .357's, having fulfilled his four-album contract; Jennings parted ways with Universal records.
On March 23, 2009, Jennings took part in CMT Crossroads, a television show in which two musicians are paired with one another and perform a small concert together for an intimate crowd. The episode paired Jennings with close friend and fellow musician Jamey Johnson. The evening's set list consisted entirely of duets, including a cover of "Outlaw country Shit" from the Waylon Forever album, two songs from Jennings's discography; "God Bless Alabama", "It Ain't Easy". As well as four songs from Johnson's album That Lonesome Song; "High Cost Of Living", "Mowing Down The Roses", "Between Jennings and Jones" and "In Color".
In February 2009, it was announced that the album would be titled Black Ribbons. It was also announced that it would be a dystopian concept rock opera and that writer Stephen King would play a major role in the album as Will O' The Wisp.
It was released independently on March 2, 2010, through Black Country Rock Records, and although it was seen as a complete departure from his country sound, the album showed off the diversity as an artist and gained him much critical acclaim, as well as a brand new underground following.
On May 1, 2010, Jennings announced "Black Ribbons: The Living Album" on his Twitter account. The "Living Album" includes the full studio record and live shows with Hierophant on a USB flash drive shaped like a tarot card. Towards the end of 2010, Jennings with the help of various other artists launched the "XXX" movement to help musicians who struggle to receive mainstream recognition.
In 2016, Jennings created and released a podcast series title "Beyond the Black" dealing with the topics and recording of Black Ribbons. The series is available on all music streaming formats as well as YouTube and the podcast's own website: www.beyondthe.black
On March 13, 2012, having signed a record deal with E1 Music, and with The Triple Crown along for the ride, Jennings returned to his country roots with the release of the album Family Man, his first self-produced outing. The album was originally meant to contain eighteen tracks, but was instead split into two albums: Family Man and 2013's The Other Life.
On July 31, 2012, Jennings was featured in Bucky Covington's debut single "The Drinking Side of Country" from the album Good Guys.
Jennings took part in the February 25 Johnny Cash 80th Birthday Bash, in which he sang Cocaine Blues With Willie Nelson and Amy Nelson. The performance was released in a DVD/CD combo.
In October 2012 Jennings was one of six commentators for the Ovation mini-series Song By Song: Johnny Cash.
"Five of these songs were recorded when we were doing Family Man, and when we were deciding what to do with it we broke it up into two records. The Other Life is representative of the other side of the coin from Family Man and the way my life has been going in a lot of ways, At first we were going to call it The Outsider, but once we got into the film we thought, 'Well, it's like a mirror, a dark mirror of what Family Man was. - Jennings told TheBoot.com.
Jennings premiered the track "Wild & Lonesome" (featuring Patti Griffin) on the 4th season of the FX original series Sons of Anarchy. Followed by the release of first official single from the album "The White Trash Song" (featuring Scott H. Biram) which premiered on RollingStones.com along with the announcement that the album would be accompanied by a film.
The album featured seven new songs, as well as two cover songs (Harry Nilsson's "Flying Saucer song" and Steve Young's "The White Trash song") and "Outlaw You", which was put out in early 2012 as a digital release.
Jennings along with filmmaker Blake Judd released The Other Life film. Running at 32 minutes long, it utilizes six of the songs from the album as a sort of narration. The film is about a musician leaving his family to tour, but when he does so he finds the road is not the same, and becomes haunted by a mysterious woman. Throughout the film, the musician is forced to face his darker urges and deal with self-discovery, temptation, isolation and rebirth. The film closes with a short adaptation of Stephen King's The Dark Tower.
The Other Life went on to win Best Short Film at the 2013 Horror Hound Festival.
The album was also heavily featured in the 2nd season of The Punisher, of which Shooter also appears, as himself.
In addition to The Magic Jennings also announced, that after nearly a decade of waiting, he would be releasing the 1995 collaborative album, Fenixon.
Both projects were released during 2014's Record Store Day, and subsequently sold out.
After reuniting with Dave Cobb, with whom Jennings made his first four records, Jennings, inspired by the 1984 Hank Williams Jr. album, Major Moves, decided to shelve the album he had already been working on and instead go in a completely different direction with Cobb and make a fun, straight-ahead drinking, rockin' record. That album, titled Shooter, was released in August 2018.
The following year Jennings teamed up with Brandi Carlile to produce Tanya Tucker's 25th album, While I'm Livin'. The record, Tucker's first in 17 years, earned Grammys for Best Country Album and Best Country Song as well as Americana Award nominations for Album of the Year, Song of the Year and Artist of the Year.
Jennings has produced albums and tracks for numerous bands including Brandi Carlile, Marilyn Manson, Tanya Tucker and American Aquarium, as well as Jessi Colter, Jamey Johnson, Jaime Wyatt, The White Buffalo, Hellbound Glory, The Mastersons, Julie Roberts, Yelawolf, Jason Boland, Billy Don Burns, Avi Kaplan, Billy Ray Cyrus, and Angry Grandpa.
Rolling Stone described Jennings as a "country rock outsider". Regarding classification of his music, Jennings said that he did not want to be pigeonholed as being solely a rock musician. Marilyn Manson argued against Jennings's work being classified as country music, saying "southern" was a more appropriate classification, noting the latter "also drags in a bit of the Stones, in a way". AllMusic described Jennings as having "established himself as an artist who played by his own rules" and said that his music is "strongly informed by both hard rock and outlaw country", while his album Black Ribbons "explored his interest in metal and electronic music".
On February 13, 2002, Shooter's father died in his sleep of diabetic complications in Chandler, Arizona. He was buried in the Mesa City Cemetery, in Mesa, Arizona. At the life tribute ceremony, on February 15, Shooter sang "I've Always Been Crazy" for the attendees, who included Waylon's close friends, family, and fellow musicians.
Jennings began dating actress Drea de Matteo in 2001. They have two children together, a daughter born in 2007 and a son born in 2011. Jennings and de Matteo eventually ended their relationship without marrying.
Jennings married long-time friend Misty Brooke Swain on June 4, 2013, in Joshua Tree, California. Swain and Jennings had met while he was in his rock band, Stargunn, and Swain was bartending at the Rainbow Bar & Grill. Shooter and Misty live in Hollywood, California.
EPs and singles
Mixing credits
| 2005 | Walk the Line | Waylon Jennings |
| 2006 | American Revolutions: The Highwaymen | Himself |
| 2013 | The Other Life | The Gunslinger |
| 2008 | Himself | |
| 2019 | Marvel's The Punisher | Himself |
|- |rowspan=3|2019 |rowspan=2| By the Way, I Forgive You |Best Americana Album | |- |Album of the Year | |- |"The Joke" |Record of the Year | |- |2020 | While I'm Livin' |Best Country Album | |- |2022 |"Right on Time" |Record of the Year |
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