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William Carter Knaak (born September 23, 1984, Austin, Texas) is an American guitarist and singer-songwriter who has released his own albums as a solo artist and Lead vocalist, and has performed as a Session musician in several bands, notably as lead guitarist in the alternative rock band Blue October and on guitar and pedal steel with Country music superstar Parker McCollum.
After this, Knaak isolated himself and played guitar for several hours every day, learning songs by his favorite bands such as Tripping Daisy, Nirvana, Soundgarden, and the Offspring. Knaak's uncle introduced him to the music of Chuck Berry’s rock ‘n’ roll and Country music greats such as Waylon Jennings, Merle Haggard, and Willie Nelson, contributing to Knaak's blend of alternative rock and country music guitar playing style.
Knaak and his dad would often dine at the Broken Spoke restaurant in Austin, which hosted live music acts. After a performance at the Spoke, performer Guitar Lynn taught Knaak the blues scale on guitar and suggested he could use this knowledge to Guitar solo with blues bands on nearly any song. As a twelve-year-old, Knaak soon found himself sitting in at gigs with local players such as Charlie Sexton and Will Sexton, Doug Sahm, and Paul Ray of the Cobras.
Aged 13, Knaak joined the kid band Redheaded Stepchild along with future Snarky Puppy guitarist Chris McQueen and other classmates. The group played western swing covers, and even wrote some original songs, releasing the album Deep, Wide, & Forever in 1998. Knaak graduated from Natural Ear Music School in Austin where his teachers included the legendary Alvin Crow and Texas Music Hall of Famer Johnny X Reed who both promptly invited him to play as sideman at their gigs, and immersed him into the deep history of the Austin blues scene in addition to adding the influences of 50s R&B and Surf music to Knaak's playing.
After a year of performing weekly concerts with Reed's band The Nortons, and Crow's group The Pleasant Valley Boys, at age sixteen Knaak was fronting his own band, Knaak Attack, with bassist Silas Parker and drummer Vincent Ambrosone. Record producer David Dickinson caught one of their shows and offered to produce an album for the group, which they sold on at their concerts throughout their formative years.
When Knaak was fifteen, the mayor of Austin, Kirk Watson, declared May 24, 2000 as Will Knaak Day, which culminated in Will headlining an outdoor concert in front of five thousand fans at Auditorium Shores. He credits this as the day when he fully committed himself to pursuing a career in music and never looked back.
Knaak joined Bowen's band for the tour in support of Bowen's 2014 self-titled album, which included an appearance on Late Night with Conan O'Brien. Knaak then played banjo and guitar on Bowen and Rogers' 2015 collaborative album Hold My Beer Vol. 1, which peaked at number 4 on the Billboard charts Country albums chart, and number 3 on Billboard's Independent Albums Chart. He played on the album's supporting tour "Hold My Beer and Watch This!" and continued as a member of Bowen's band until 2018. Inspired by the birth of his daughter, and unable to tour during the COVID-19 pandemic, Knaak recorded a solo album Live in Lockdown Vol. 1 which he released via Bandcamp on June 23, 2020. On April 29, 2022 Knaak self-released a jazz-influenced Minimal music instrumental album entitled Lonely Lo-Fi. In November 2022 Knaak launched a kickstarter campaign for his next solo album Dying Day which he described as a "gritty, soulful, bluesy, and roots-based". The campaign raised over $20,000, double the initial goal. Knaak's goal was to record the album by June 2023 and release it in 2024. As of August 2023, the recording sessions are complete, and the album will be mixed by Blue October's recording engineer Eric Holtz in mid 2023, in preparation for a 2024 release.
In June–July 2022, Knaak toured as a sideman in Parker McCollum's band, which included several dates opening for Thomas Rhett. Following the tour, he accepted an offer to be full-time guitarist in McCollum's band starting in December 2022. Knaak toured extensively as a member of McCollum's backing band for the next several years. On March 30, 2023, the band performed their song "Handle on You" on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.
| 1998 | RedHeaded Stepchild | Deep, Wide, & Forever |
| 2004 | Alvin Crow | White Trash Opera |
| 2006 | Melissa Sellers | Deep South Austin |
| 2009 | The Statesboro Revue | A Different Kind of Light |
| 2009 | Wes Hayden | Full Circle |
| 2010 | Jon Wolfe | It All Happened in a Honky Tonk |
| 2015 | Randy Rogers and Wade Bowen | Hold My Beer Vol. 1 |
| 2015 | Royal Southern Brotherhood | Don't Look Back: The Muscle Shoals Sessions |
| 2015 | Pauline Reese | Just Getting Started |
| 2016 | Will Knaak | The Only Open Road |
| 2016 | Will Knaak & the Voodoo Exorcists | Will Knaak & the Voodoo Exorcists |
| 2017 | Knaak Attack | Knaak Attack |
| 2018 | Blue October | I Hope You're Happy |
| 2019 | Blue October | King |
| 2019 | Jake Lloyd | MoonLit Mornings |
| 2019 | Blue October | Live From Manchester |
| 2020 | Will Knaak | Live in Lockdown Vol. 1 |
| 2020 | Blue October | This Is What I Live For |
| 2020 | Lia Catallo | In My Fantasies |
| 2022 | Will Knaak | Lonely Lofi |
| 2022 | Blue October | Spinning the Truth Around (Part I) |
| 2022 | Durawa | One Human Race |
| 2025 | Will Knaak | Dying Day |
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