Cody Hanson (born May 24, 1982) is an American musician and record producer. He is the drummer and one of the founding members in the Oklahoma based rock band Hinder and co-owns the production company Back Lounge Productions with bandmate Marshal Dutton. Hanson has also provided drum work in the country group Drankmore.
Early life Hanson was born in Plano, Texas but relocated to Jones, Oklahoma with his family when he was one year old. At the age of 12, Hanson received his first drum kit as a Christmas gift. He immediately fell in love with the drums and began teaching himself how to play, he started a band in middle school but lost interest in the drums by high school and began playing guitar.
Career
Early years
While studying business and marketing at the University of Central Oklahoma in 2001, Hanson with the help of Joe "Blower" Garvey, met Austin John Winkler at a college party while Austin was singing in a cover band. Hanson bragged of Austin saying he was "blown away" and "he has the kind of charisma very few people have and that unique voice. You can't really compare him to anybody." Shortly after, the three got together and formed Hinder. Before forming the band, Hanson said that he had not picked up a set of drumsticks for over two years before the day Hinder began.
Hanson alongside Winkler and Garvey recorded their first band practice with a karaoke machine and for the next week let everyone they knew listen to their tape. For the next few years Hanson continued to go to school for business and marketing and took everything he knew and incorporated it into the music business.
In late 2003 Hanson released his first EP with Hinder titled Far from Close. The EP was released via Brickden Records and sold 5,000 copies.
After the success of the group's debut EP Far from Close and extensive touring, including building a local fan base at the local Oklahoma City club The Blue Note, Hanson and the other members in Hinder were offered recording contracts with Atlantic Records, Roadrunner Records and Universal Records, eventually signing with Universal in January 2005.
Hanson released his debut album with Hinder titled Extreme Behavior, which Hanson didn't play on, September 27, 2005. The album spawned the hit singles, "Get Stoned", "Better Than Me", and "Lips of an Angel". To date the album is 3× platinum. Hanson along with Winkler wrote the majority of the songs on the album.
Mainstream success: 2007–2011
After touring nonstop in support of Extreme Behavior from 2006 to late 2007, Hanson and his other bandmates began writing and recording for their next album. In July 2008 Hanson released the lead single titled "Use Me" from his band's sophomore album Take It to the Limit.
Hanson released Take It to the Limit with Hinder November 4, 2008, the album debuted at number 4 on the Billboard Top 200 chart. As of March 25, 2013 the album has sold over 500,000 copies in the US reaching Gold status. Hinder toured in support of Take It to the Limit, the tours included multiple headlining and supporting tours, the most notable were Nickelback's Dark Horse Tour alongside Papa Roach and Saving Abel and Saints Of Los Angeles Tour with Theory of a Deadman and The Last Vegas.
In January 2010 Hanson and the other members in Hinder had the idea to set up a recording studio in the back of their tour bus to start recording their next album early and save time when they're off tour.
Hanson released his third studio album with Hinder, All American Nightmare on December 7, 2010. According to Hanson, he and Winkler wrote over 70 songs for the album and cut the recording process down to 10. Hanson and Winkler wrote the majority of the material for the album with additional help from former Faktion guitarist Dutton, The Warren Brothers, and country music artist Jeffrey Steele. Dutton became close friends with the group while his former band Faktion was touring in support of Hinder during their "Girls Gone Wild Tour" back in 2006. and Hanson co-produced the album alongside producer Kevin Churko. The album spawned 5 singles, "All American Nightmare", "What Ya Gonna Do", "The Life", "Hey Ho" and "Red Tail Lights". The group toured all throughout 2011 in support of the album.
New era of Hinder & side projects: 2012–2018
Hanson went into 2012 preparing to start writing and recording his Hinder's fourth studio album. During the downtime Hanson along with frequent collaborator and friend, Dutton co-founded the production company "Back Lounge Productions" together and created a new band named Seabass & tha Fellas. The comedy duo between Hanson and Dutton acted as a side-project in between Hinder's recording sessions and tour dates, with humorous lyrics and instrumentals in the style of the comedy trio, The Lonely Island, and the Glam metal parody band, Steel Panther. Seabass & tha Fellas released their debut single "Pocket" on February 14, 2012. Upon the single's release during a phone live phone interview with Rock 108 KEYJ radio, the duo challenged then President Barack Obama and his opponent in the 2012 election, Mitt Romney to a tag team Celebrity Deathmatch.
During Hinder's downtime Hanson also provided drums for Dutton's country group, Drankmore with Dutton on lead guitar, Jarrod Denton on vocals, Hanson on drums and then Garvey, Mark King and Mike Rodden from Hinder providing extra guitar during live shows. The group released two singles and released one audio clip of a potentially hit song called "I Do" on Back Lounge Production's website. Hanson alongside Winkler and Dutton wrote the material for Hinder's fourth studio album entirely, with Hanson and Dutton producing the entire album themselves. The lead single "Save Me" was released August 29, 2012. Hanson's fourth studio album with Hinder titled "Welcome to the Freakshow" was released December 4, 2012. The album spawned the hit single "Should've Known Better". The band toured in support of the album throughout the spring and summer 2013.
On July 23, 2013, Hanson along with the rest of his bandmates were involved in a tour bus accident resulting in injuries for members of the band and crew. Hanson announced via the band's social media accounts that while traveling to their show at the Boise Music Festival their bus was unexpectedly cut off by another vehicle and resulted in a crash that left members of the band and crew suffering multiple injuries and were required to spend the night at the ER. Hanson also stated that upon doctor's orders, the band will be taking some time off to heal.
When Winkler left abruptly in the middle of the groups 2013 Welcome To The Freakshow tour to check himself into rehab Hanson and the remainder of his bandmates in Hinder continued the tour with Jared Weeks from the band Saving Abel, and Hinder co-writer and producer Dutton stepped in as rotating lead-singers for the remainder of the summer tour dates. Upon Winkler's official departure from the band in November 2013 Hanson and the three other members of Hinder quickly began searching for a new vocalist to replace him. The group also played sets of songs at Major's Bar in Edmond, Oklahoma with fellow Hinder band-mates and other good friends. While Hinder wasn't touring in the summer of 2013, Hanson toured with his and Dutton's country band Drankmore in support of their singles. In the search for a new singer for Hinder Hanson reached out to Nashville-based singer Nolan Neal, which led to the band performing a few live sets with Neal as lead singer from July–September 2014 as a try-out run. Together, Hanson, Dutton and Nolan Neal wrote the Hinder song "Hit The Ground" together while Hanson and Dutton produced the song. Hinder originally released "Hit The Ground" with Nolan Neal on lead vocals on November 24, 2014. After negative reviews Hanson and the other band-mates in Hinder decided Nolan Neal's voice was "too country" for the band.
On January 22, 2015, Hanson announced via Hinder's social media sites that Dutton would be the new lead vocalist. Hinder released a new version of "Hit The Ground" with Dutton on vocals. Cody and Marshal wrote and produced Hinder's 2015 album When the Smoke Clears entirely. The album included two covers, "Dead To Me" which was a song done by Marshal's originally band Faktion and the song "Nothing Left To Lose" originally recorded by 9 Left Dead, whose debut album was produced by Hanson and Dutton at Back Lounge Productions. When The Smoke Clears debuted at number 4 on the iTunes rock charts and spawned the singles "Hit The Ground", "Letting Go" and the hit single "Intoxicated".
In January 2016 Hanson announced in an interview that they are already writing songs for the next full length Hinder album and that they will be releasing an acoustic EP titled Stripped on May 13, 2016.
After embarking on an acoustic tour during the spring and summer of 2016 in support of the new Stripped EP, Hanson along with the rest of his bandmates began heavily writing and recording material for Hinder's sixth studio album. An October 9, 2016 post Hanson posted on the band's official Facebook and Instagram accounts stated that the he and the group began working with pianist and songwriter Sarah Thiele for some new tracks on the upcoming album. On December 11, 2016, Hanson posted another new update on the album's recording process via Hinder's official social media accounts with a photo of him and bassist Mike Rodden with a caption reading "Just taking a nice break from working on the album in Nicaragua!".
During an April 19, 2017 interview with Loudwire Hanson debuted the upcoming new Hinder single Remember Me will be released with an accompanying music video on April 28, 2017. In the following months while on tour with Nonpoint, Hanson revealed in another interview with Loudwire that his new album with Hinder titled The Reign will be released on August 11, 2017 and that the group had signed a new record deal with The End Records to release the new album.
On August 30, 2017, it was revealed by the attorney Blake Johnson via The Oklahoman that Hanson and the remaining band-members in Hinder filed a lawsuit against Winkler for allegedly unlawfully using the band's trademark to promote his solo career after exiting the group in 2013. The lawsuit filed in Oklahoma City federal court accuses Winkler of violating the agreement made with his former bandmates upon his departure from Hinder that allows him to promote himself as "Austin John Winkler, formerly of Hinder" and that the agreement also explains if Winkler utilizes the Hinder name in promotional materials, the band's name or logo can't be larger or more prominent than his individual name within the advertisement.
In support of the new album The Reign, Hanson participated in Hinder's fall 2017 co-headlining tour with Buckcherry's lead singer Josh Todd,Adelitas Way, and Wayland.
Hinder tours & Dangerous Hippies: 2018–2023
In early 2018 Hanson announced via an Instagram story he and Dutton have begun working on new music and shared multiple short clips of unreleased demos. On November 7, 2018, Hanson announced Hinder's 2019 Lucky 7 Tour via the band's social media profiles with Soil as the tour's opening act.
Hanson announced on a Facebook post in early January 2019 that Hinder would release anew song titled "Halo" on January 25, 2019. At the time it was mentioned to be the lead single for their untitled seventh studio album which was slated to be released later that year. Hanson released a cover of the hit song "Life in the Fast Lane" by the Eagles with Hinder on July 25, 2019.