James Barker Band

In 2015, they won the Emerging Artist Showcase at the Boots and Hearts Music Festival and the following year, they were signed to Universal Music Canada.^[3] The band's debut extended play, Game On, was released April 21, 2017.^[4] The band received two Juno Award nominations for Breakthrough Group of the Year and Country Album of the Year at the 2018 Juno Awards,^[5] winning the second.^[6] In 2018, the band's song "Chills", cowritten by Barker, Gavin Slate, Travis Wood and Donovan Woods, received a SOCAN Songwriting Prize nomination^[7] and won the award for Single of the Year at the Canadian Country Music Awards.^[8][9]

The band became the first artist to record a globally released Spotify Singles session in Canada in November 2018.^[10][11] Their second extended play, Singles Only, was released May 24, 2019.^[12] It included the singles "Good Together", "Keep It Simple", "There's a Drink for That", and "Slow Down Town". They would follow that up with the standalone single "Summer Time" in June 2020,^[13] and the extended play JBB-Sides in August 2020.^[14]

In May 2021, they signed a record deal with Sony Music Nashville and Villa 40, and released the single "Over All Over Again",^[15][16] which became their third Canada Country number one.^[17] In October 2021, they released the song "New Old Trucks", which features American country singer Dierks Bentley.^[18] They followed that up with "Wastin' Whiskey" in 2022 on Starseed Records.^[19] In the spring and summer of 2022, the band joined Dallas Smith as an opening act on his headlining "Some Things Never Change Tour" across Canada.^[20] In January 2023, the band signed with Records Nashville, a joint venture between Sony Music Entertainment and Barry Weiss, and released the single "Meet Your Mama".^[21] They would follow that up with the single "On the Water" featuring American country artist Dalton Dover in May of 2023.^[22] Both songs are included on their extended play Ahead of Our Time, which was released on October 20, 2023.^[23]

In January 2025, the band released the single "You Didn't Hear It From Me", after returning to their original label Universal Music Canada.^[24] The song later became their sixth number one hit in Canada.^[25] They released their first full-length studio album One of Us on September 5, 2025.^[26] The band supported the album with the headlining "Bud Light Buckle Up Tour" across Canada in the fall of 2025.^[27] They are nominated for Juno Fan Choice and Country Album of the Year at the Juno Awards of 2026.^[28]