Dallas Smith wasn’t kidding when he titled his 2012 debut Jumped Right In. The album signaled not just the launch of Smith’s solo career after a decade fronting the Vancouver alt-rock band Default, but also his immersion in a completely different genre: country music. However, Smith’s innate, fist-clenching sincerity and arena-tested pipes—which he first flexed on Default’s 2001 post-grunge power-ballad hit “Wasting My Time”—allowed him to cross over with ease and attract fans from both sides of the active-rock/country divide. Born in Langley, B.C. in 1977, Smith became an instant fixture on Canadian country radio with his first single, 2011's “Somebody Somewhere,” a wistful post-breakup lament nonetheless delivered with the sort of celebratory, top-down gusto that drew from his rocker roots. With 2014’s fist-pumping road anthem “Wastin’ Gas,” Smith logged his first No. 1 country hit, and would land eight more in the top spot before the decade was done, finding equal success with nostalgic serenades like “Timeless” and more widescreen statements like “Autograph,” whose night-sky expanse owes as much to The Joshua Tree as Nashville. And while Smith is right at home duetting with Canadian country legend Terri Clark on a whiskey-slinging sing-along (2019’s “One Drink Ago”), he can also hang with Nashville’s new school, going shot-for-shot with the party-hearty HARDY on their 2020 chart-topper “Some Things Never Change.”
