Line #10 Music/VinceGill


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/vince_660_9bb23cc837.jpg]]
2	Vincent Grant Gill (born April 12, 1957) is an American CountryMusic artist known for his silky tenor voice, multifaceted style, and instrumental prowess on both guitar and mandolin. He has a reputation for being one of the kindest people in UsefulNotes/{{Nashville}}.
3
4	Gill began his career in the 1970s in {{Bluegrass}} bands before joining the country rock band Pure Prairie League in 1979 as a singer and guitarist. The Gill-sung "Let Me Love You Tonight" became the band's biggest hit, reaching #1 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart and #10 on the Hot 100 in 1980. The next year he left to join Rodney Crowell's backing band, The Cherry Bombs, then signed as a solo act with Creator/RCARecords in 1983, putting out three modestly successful albums: ''Turn Me Loose'', ''The Things That Matter'', and ''The Way Back Home''. After transferring to MCA in 1989, Gill's career kicked into motion: his first MCA disc produced the #2 hit "When I Call Your Name", with his next four albums each producing several Top 10 hits (including four number 1 hits from ''I Still Believe in You''). It was at MCA that Gill developed his signature style, blending mainstream country and bluegrass, often with a high emphasis on ballads.
5
6	Although Gill's fortunes faded in the late 1990s, he continues to record to this day. He can frequently be heard singing backing vocals on just about everything and joined Music/{{Eagles}} in 2017 along with Glenn Frey's son Deacon after Frey's death the year before.
7
8	----
9	!Tropes present in Gill's work:
10	* AdvertisedExtra: He usually tends to be credited quite extensively just for a backing vocal. But perhaps the most extreme example is on Music/ChrisYoung's "Sober Saturday Night", which has him sing backing vocals on just a couple lines of the chorus and contribute a very brief guitar solo.
11	* DistantDuet: With Music/RebaMcEntire for "The Heart Won't Lie."
12	* DistinctDoubleAlbum: ''These Days'' is a 4-disc set on which each disc has a distinctly different style.
13	* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness:
14	** He happened to join Pure Prairie League just as they were shifting their sound from country rock to soft rock; they even added a saxophone player to their lineup. "Let Me Love You Tonight", while still a frequently-heard oldie, has Gill sounding really out-of-place, if you're familiar with his later country hits.
15	** His 1980s work for RCA is noticeably more pop, with a high emphasis on keyboards instead of the neotraditionalist feel he built on MCA.
16	* {{Foreshadowing}}: He sang the Eagles hit "I Can't Tell You Why" on ''Common Thread'', the country tribute album to the band, in 1993; come 2017, he'd replaced Glenn Frey in the band.
17	* InappropriatelyCloseComrades: The framing device for the music video of "The Heart Don't Lie," a duet with Music/RebaMcEntire, is a Navy recruit and her Marine drill instructor that is unable to be acted upon.
18	* RecordProducer: For most of the 90s and into the 2000s, he was produced by Tony Brown, a former session keyboardist also known for producing Music/RebaMcEntire and Music/GeorgeStrait.
19	* SignatureStyle: Softly produced country with his trademark high, smooth tenor voice. Some of his songs also feature the fluid, high-toned "crying steel" playing of pedal steel guitarist John Hughey, such as "Look at Us".
20	* TruckDriversGearChange: "Oklahoma Swing", a duet with Music/RebaMcEntire, starts off in B-flat with Vince, then drops down to E-flat for Reba. It then stays in the lower key, except for an instrumental break that returns to B-flat.
21	* VocalEvolution: His voice had a somewhat stuffy sound when he was in Pure Prairie League, but became smoother in his solo work. It also started to become more weathered in the 21st century.

Context Music / VinceGill