Before Brett Young scored a couple No. 1 hits and made his way onto big name tours, he used to be the local bartender just trying to make a living.
Young used to mix drinks at a number of local California bars near his hometown as his part-time profession while still trying to get the music gig to work out. Thankfully, he persuaded a few of his managers to give his live show a go whenever the nights weren’t turning out too hot.
“We all have to have jobs in order to support our musical habits, you know. I bartended for a lot of years and it always, A) it’s just a great source of income and it frees you up to have your days to write songs but B) you’re in these establishments that as a bar or restaurant you’re mostly successful on the weekends and you’re always looking for things to plug into your off days during the week. And being a musician who had played bars and restaurants I was bar tending somewhere that had a slow Tuesday or Wednesday I’d be like, ‘Hey, and by the way, you should have a live music night,’” Young explained about his former days.
His experience, while rather limited in the live venue world, benefited his career later on by establishing a stage presence he could connect to in the end. Although Young picked up shop and moved to Nashville, his humble beginnings in Orange County, California, led the way for his successful future.
“So it turned into when I was in Orange County, five nights a week at different establishments, in L.A. it was three nights a week, which is really hard to do,” said Young. “And I think, had I not been bartending in those rooms I probably wouldn’t have had the ability to identify a place that needed live music. And so it was not just a fun way to spend a Tuesday [or] Wednesday night, but it was also a way to basically call practice work and get paid for it.”
Young joins a standout group of artists in the New Artist of the Year category for the 51st Annual CMA Awards, which is set to air on Wednesday, November 8.
