​Eric Barnett is a former factory worker, husband, cat-dad, and the son of a car salesman and a schoolteacher. He hails from Galion, Ohio - a small Midwestern town in the heart of the rust belt.  Eric started out playing trumpet in grade school, then guitar in junior high. In high school and college, he played as a sideman and occasional frontman in many bands of varying genres within the “rock” vein. After a short stint in ambient and avant-garde music, he settled upon what he felt like he should have been doing all along - writing songs and singing his story.
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In 2011, Eric first started playing his own songs as a solo performer under the adopted moniker “whiskeyheart”, with an EP and a short Ohio tour to follow. During that time, the long factory hours prevented him from being able to play out much, so he concentrated on writing songs about the working class, trees, birds, roads, loved ones here and gone, and a time that is slipping away. His music hints at his influences: Tom Waits, Neil Young, Randy Newman, Tom Petty, Lennon/McCartney, Jim Croce, Warren Zevon - and yet the style is still his own.


After a few years of sporadic shows, Eric decided to drop the “whisheyheart” handle. In late 2016, after the factory he worked at for 13 years closed its doors, Eric and his wife Andrea decided to pack it in and move to Charleston, South Carolina. During that time, Eric began work on his first full-length release, "Shipwreck in a Bottle." Recording most of the instruments himself in his Galion basement, the DIY album sums up Eric's first 5 years playing as a solo singer-songwriter. After a successful Kickstarter campaign to fund the mastering and pressing of the album, "Shipwreck" was released on June 23rd, 2017. With the album in hand, Eric is ready for a fresh start in Charleston.

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