Isakov was born in Johannesburg, South Africa, and raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where he began touring with a band at the age of 16 before eventually relocating to Colorado to hone his talents as a solo artist. He released his debut album, Rust Colored Stones, in 2003, followed by Songs for October (2005), That Sea, the Gambler (2007), and The Empty Northern Hemisphere (2009), the latter of which spawned the single "If I Go, I'm Goin," which appeared in the fourth season of the popular Showtime series Californication. Arriving in 2013, The Weatherman included the singles "Time Will Tell" and "Suitcase Full of Sparks," the latter of which was featured on an episode of the popular NBC crime thriller The Blacklist.
In 2016, he released the ambitious Gregory Alan Isakov with the Colorado Symphony, which saw him reworking material from past albums with a full orchestra. Isakov recorded his next studio long-player, Evening Machines, at home on his working three-acre farm -- in addition to making music, he sells vegetable seeds and grows his own market crops. The lush, 12-song set, whittled down from 40, was mixed by Tucker Martine (Neko Case, the Decemberists) and released in October 2018, earning Isakov a Grammy nomination for Best Folk Album. ~ James Christopher Monger, Rovi