Rayland Baxter was born in Bon Aqua, Tennessee (not far from Nashville) on September 26, 1983. Rayland grew up in a house full of music; his father is Bucky Baxter (aka William Baxter), a noted pedal steel guitarist who has worked with Bob Dylan, Steve Earle, R.E.M., and Ryan Adams. Rayland was about nine years old when his father gave him an electric guitar, but even though Rayland enjoyed music and learned to play his new instrument, his first love was sports, and the young man was more interested in spending time outside than picking. Baxter would go on to play lacrosse at Loyola University, but injuries to his knees put an end to his career as a competitor, and with sports no longer a priority, Rayland's interest in music deepened. Rayland quit school and moved to Creede, Colorado, where he wrote songs, played open-mike nights, and busked for change. Rayland next landed a job as a roadie with the band Moonshine Sessions, and a tour of Europe prompted an extended stay in Paris, but when a brief romance left Baxter with a broken heart, he took a friend up on an offer to spend some time in Israel, where he immersed himself in classic singer/songwriter albums (including artists such as Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, and Townes Van Zandt), and committed himself to the art of songwriting. By the summer of 2010 Baxter had settled in Nashville, and began playing local showcases and open-mike nights; his first EP, The Miscalculation of Song, appeared a few months later. Baxter's first album, Feathers & FishHooks, which featured extensive instrumental work from Rayland's father, was released by an independent label in 2012, and by the end of the year Baxter had signed with the artist-friendly ATO Records label, who quickly reissued Feathers & FishHooks. Baxter supported the album with touring, including road dates opening for the Civil Wars and Grace Potter & the Nocturnals, and while off the road he made his home in a ramshackle house in Nashville he shared with several friends, where he slept on a screened-in porch. In 2015 Rayland dropped his second full-length album, the ambitious Imaginary Man. ~ Mark Deming