John Corbett   -  Biography

John Corbett grew up in Wheeling, W.V., a blue-collar mining and steel mill town on the Ohio River that's famous as a music center. He and his mother lived in an apartment five blocks from the Capitol Music Hall, home to the Wheeling Jamboree -- now known as Jamboree USA. The live Saturday country music show is the second-longest running live radio broadcast, after the Grand Ole Opry. As a kid, Corbett hung out at his Uncle Phil's music joint, Club Madrid. His mother was a waitress, her boyfriend worked the door and his grandmother made sauerkraut and hot dogs for everyone. Country and rock musicians who played at the Capitol Music Hall would stop by after shows, so Corbett got to see performers like Buck Owens get on stage at the 150-seat club and jam with the house band. Corbett played bass in a high school band that performed at house parties and school functions, taking the lead vocal on songs like Cheap Trick's "Surrender." By the time he moved to California in 1986, he brought along the guitar he'd started playing. A friend introduced him to Tara Novick, a 15-year-old rockabilly guitarist who later formed a well-regarded L.A. band, the Voodoo Boys. Corbett and Novick continued to play music together for fun after the actor scored his first big role as philosophical deejay Chris Stevens on the TV show Northern Exposure. The first time Corbett appeared on The Tonight Show, he called ahead to ask if he could bring his band and perform a song. The talent director hesitated, asking for a tape. Corbett explained he didn't have anything recorded, but he pressed the issue, and the talent director suggested he show up two hours earlier than usual to audition. He got the nod and was allowed to appear -- a rare case of a musician getting a coveted performance on the late-night talk show without a record deal or even a record at all. For a decade, Corbett owned a large music club in Seattle called the Phoenix where he hung out and supported touring and local acts. He'd occasionally get up and sing "Johnny B. Goode" but rarely. Through it all, he stayed in touch with Novick. When Corbett moved back to L.A. in 2000, the two immediately hooked back up and started jamming again. His acting roles included the TV series Sex in the City (as Aidan Shaw) and the film My Big Fat Greek Wedding (as Ian Miller). In 2004, Corbett presented an award at the CMT Flameworthy Awards in Nashville. The actor had considered himself a country music fan since seeing Dwight Yoakam perform in Hollywood in 1986, and he'd always had fond memories of the country musicians who performed at his uncle's club in Wheeling. But this was his first trip to Nashville. Using his own money, Corbett and Novick went through whirlwind meetings with music publishers, gathering more than a dozen songs that excited them. They learned the tunes in a rush, sitting in a car in a hotel parking lot because that was the only CD player they had. The next day, they began work with the band they'd hired to record the dozen songs in a furious weekend session. Corbett will release the album in early 2006 on his own label.