With their catchy, melodic pop/rock and mildly distorted but warm guitar tone, Collective Soul leapt out of Stockbridge, Georgia to the top of the 1990s AOR world. Vocalist/guitarist/songwriter Ed Roland, whose parents prohibited listening to music, originally founded the band in the mid-'80s after dropping out of the Berklee School of Music due to lack of funds and getting a job in a 24-track recording studio. The band drew no interest whatsoever from any label, and a disheartened Roland called it quits in 1992 to put together a songwriter's demo in hopes of finding work. A demo of "Shine" caught the attention of several radio stations and eventually Atlantic Records, and Roland hastily put together a new version of Collective Soul with his brother Dean on guitar, Ross Childress on lead guitar, Will Turpin on bass, and original drummer Shane Evans. "Shine" became an AOR smash and was an inescapable hit on MTV and radio during the spring and summer of 1994; it helped the band's debut album, Hints, Allegations and Things Left Unsaid, sell over a million copies by the end of the year. Their self-titled follow-up was released in 1995 and spawned the radio hits "Gel, " "December, " and "The World I Know." Disciplined Breakdown, Collective Soul's third album, was released in March 1997; Dosage followed two years later.