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It’s been almost a year since Blackjack Billy burst onto the music scene with their debut single “The Booze Cruise” the group is clearly one of the hottest independent acts on the country music scene today.
Although primarily from south of the border one of the founding members, Jeff Coplan, is originally from Montreal and is actually responsible for, in part, developing the group Love and Theft. He also published their debut album and co-wrote their #1 hit Angel Eyes along with Eric Gunderson and Eric Paslay. Coplan is also known for producing and engineering albums for Bowling for Soup, Love and Theft and Canada’s own Tim Hicks. Although Coplan’s work with Blackjack Billy also started out as an artist development project it wasn’t long before he became part of the band himself.
Other members have also had their share of success before Blackjack Billy, Rob Blackledge co-wrote Love & Theft‘s first top 10 single “Runaway” with LNT’s Stephen Barker Liles and Canaan Smith. ”Runaway” reached No. 10 on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart. Noll Billings has a publishing deal as a songwriter with EMI Music Group. Both Blackledge and Noll currently have publishing deals with Vandermont Music Group. Brad Cummings and Patrick Cornell joined the band in 2012. Cornell has played bass for Camp Freddy and Cummings previous played drums for Randy Houser and Bobby Bare Jr. The group recently teamed up with Tim Hicks to record his latest single, “Got a Feeling”
All of this experience combines into a toe tappin’, country rockin’ good time. Although the group has graced the stage in Canada to date all of their appearances to date have been in Western Canada you can catch Blackjack Billy at some of the biggest country music festivals in Canada this summer including a stop at Dauphin’s Countryfest in Manitoba this June as well as the 25th Anniversary Havelock Jamboree in Ontario in August. For more information on Blackjack Billy visit their website www.blackjackbilly.com
