Chase Rice | |
Number of songs: 4 | Total weeks on charts: 64
Appearing in a total number of: 8 charts | Total period running: 212 days
Appearing in a total number of: 8 charts | Total period running: 212 days
Biography
Chase Rice (born September 19, 1986) is an American country singer and songwriter. He co-wrote the single "Cruise" performed by Florida Georgia Line. He released the EP Ready Set Roll, featuring the single "Ready Set Roll", on October 15, 2013. The full-length album Ignite the Night was released on August 19, 2014 and includes "Ready Set Roll", the gold single. On August 27, 2014 Ignite The Night debuted at #1 on Billboard Top Country Albums. 
He was a contestant on Survivor: Nicaragua, where he was the runner-up to Jud "Fabio" Birza. 

Born in Florida, Chase Rice was raised on a farm in Asheville, North Carolina. He attended AC Reynolds High School and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he was a linebacker on the football team. 

After graduating from UNC, he was selected to join the Hendrick Motorsports pit crew as the rear tire carrier for Ryan Newman’s Nationwide series car. He also worked on Jimmie Johnson's Cup car and won two championships with the Lowe's team. 

Rice was selected as a castmember of Survivor: Nicaragua. He said that he was able to get his application into CBS through a college friend who had a connection with the network. 

Rice was originally on the "La Flor" tribe, consisting of younger contestants. During his time on the tribe, he was quickly attracted to fellow contestant Brenda Lowe, who became aware of his attraction and used it to her advantage, recruiting him and several others into an alliance. However, after La Flor won three of the first four tribal immunity challenges, the tribes were mixed up, and Rice ended up on the new version of the original "older contestants'" tribe, "Espada," while Lowe remained on the new version of the La Flor tribe. Rice and Lowe both ultimately made it to the merged group, "Libertad," where their alliance successfully caused the eliminations of Alina Wilson and Marty Piombo, before turning on Lowe and eliminating her as a threat. Following Lowe's elimination, Rice continued on with the alliance under the new leader Matthew "Sash" Lenahan. After two contestants (NaOnka Mixon and Kelly Shinn) quit, the alliance continued eliminating targets Ben "Benry" Henry, Jane Bright, Dan Lembo, and Holly Hoffman. The alliance tried to eliminate Jud "Fabio" Birza as a threat against the jury, but Birza managed to evade them by winning the last three consecutive immunity challenges. Rice performed exceptionally well in the post-merge challenges, being on the winning team in 2 of the 3 team-oriented reward challenges, and winning the last two individual reward challenges. Eventually, Rice made it to the final three alongside Lenahan and Birza, where he had a chance to win the $1 million prize, and title of "Sole Survivor." In pleading his case to the jury, Rice claimed that he was being open with the jury about how he played the game, but was criticized both for his rash decisions and occasional indecisiveness, as well as being perceived as a follower under both Lowe and Lenahan. Although both Rice and Lenahan tried to accuse Birza of not knowing what was going on in the competition, the jury still ultimately chose Birza as the winner. Birza received 5 of the 9 jury votes while Rice received 4 (the votes of Hoffman, Bright, Lowe, and Wilson), in one of the closest jury votes in Survivor history. 

On the nationally-televised reunion show, Rice played his single "Buzz Back". Although he received national media attention on the show, he says that reality show stardom did not help propel his country music career; instead, he cited it as an important life event that was more valuable than money and that put his life in perspective. 
In the official issue of CBS Watch magazine, commemorating the 15th anniversary of Survivor in 2015, Rice was voted by viewers as the 10th most attractive male contestant in Survivor history. 

Rice began playing guitar in college. He cites his father as the inspiration for his country career, recalling his father saying "boy anyone can play guitar, but no one is gonna really listen to you until you start singing." He models his albums after his live show and is building his career through the performance aspect. His first studio album, Friday Nights & Sunday Mornings, did not have a definite date of release, but it is believed to have been released sometime in 2010. This 13 track album includes Rice's first song he ever wrote/recorded, “Larger Than Lifeâ€, which is about the passing of his father. In March 2011, he released Country as Me, a 6 track EP featuring his single "Buzz Back". Rice has received air play as a "Highway Find" on satellite radio channel The Highway (Sirius XM). In April 2012, his Dirt Road Communion debuted as #48 on the Billboard Country Albums chart and was the #6 download on iTunes for the week. 

In July 2012, he signed with Creative Artists Agency. He was a co-writer of Florida Georgia Line's "Cruise", which topped Billboard Hot Country Songs. 

In October 2013, he released Ready Set Roll, a 6 song EP including the title track. Ready Set Roll peaked at #1 on the iTunes Country album chart. The physical version of the album was released in November 2013 and included the bonus song "Jack Daniel's and Jesus". On January 29, 2014, the official "Ready Set Roll" music video premiered exclusively on CMT. 
The next day, the video debuted on VEVO. He partnered with Columbia Records for distribution of "Ready Set Roll" in March 2014. 

On June 30, 2014, Rice released the album cover, release date, and album sequence for Ignite the Night. The full-length album was released on August 19, 2014 and includes the Platinum-certified single, "Ready Set Roll". 

Rice has reportedly had few relationships throughout his career, as he was quoted saying in a 2013 Watershed Fest interview although there were multiple exchanges and pictures with Rice and Katie Stahl, a 20 year old model. 

Discography: 
Friday Nights & Sunday Mornings (2010) 
Country as Me (2011) 
Dirt Road Communion (2012) 
Ignite the Night (2014)
Sources: Wikipedia, Top40-Charts.com Editorial team
Chase Rice in the news