Hootie & The Blowfish
Rucker has been the lead singer of Hootie & the Blowfish since its formation in 1986. He met fellow band members, Mark Bryan, Jim "Soni" Sonefeld, and Dean Felber, while attending the University of South Carolina. Bryan heard Rucker singing in the shower, and the two became a duo, playing R.E.M. covers at a local venue. They later recruited Felber and finally Sonefeld joined in 1989. As a member of Hootie & the Blowfish, Rucker has recorded five studio albums: Cracked Rear View, Fairweather Johnson, Musical Chairs, Hootie & the Blowfish and Looking for Lucky, also charting within the top 40 of the Billboard Hot 100 six times. All six albums feature songs that Rucker, Bryan and Felber wrote. As the frontman, Rucker began to be called simply "Hootie" in the media, though the band title combines the nicknames of his college friends.
Rucker's signature contribution to the band is his baritone voice which Rolling Stone has called "ingratiating," TIME has called "low, gruff, charismatic," and Entertainment Weekly has characterized as a "barrelhouse growl." He has brought additional attention as the sole African-American member of a major rock band with otherwise white members. Rucker said they "flipped" the formula of the all black band with a white frontman, like Frank Sinatra performing with Count Basie. Musically, he has sometimes been criticized or spoofed for not being "black enough". Saturday Night Live ran a sketch of Tim Meadows playing Rucker leading beer-drinking, white fraternity members in a counter-march to Louis Farrakhan's Million Man March. He also received death threats for singing the Hootie song "Drowning," a protest song against the flying of the Confederate flag above the South Carolina statehouse. The other band members were protective of Rucker in regards to the issue, and had a policy of generally ignoring racist comments.
Shortly after gaining a measure of fame, Felber and Rucker (who consider themselves best friends) moved into an apartment in Columbia, South Carolina. With Rucker's recognition as the frontman of a successful band came increased opportunities. In October 1995, Rucker was asked to sing the national anthem at the World Series. Frank Sinatra invited Rucker to sing at his 80th birthday party; Rucker sang "The Lady Is a Tramp." That same week, he made a voice cameo in an episode of the sitcom Friends. He also joined Nanci Griffith on the song "Gulf Coast Highway" from her 1997 album Blue Roses from the Moons, and sang backing vocals on Radney Foster's 1999 album See What You Want to See. Rucker encouraged Atlantic Records to agree to a deal with Edwin McCain, and made a guest appearance on McCain's debut album, Honor Among Thieves.
In regards to the future of Hootie & the Blowfish, Rucker was quoted by CBSnews as stating in late 2011 that "I don't think we'll ever break up totally. We're Hootie & the Blowfish ... We'll make another record and do another tour someday. I don't know when, but it will happen. There's one more in us."
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