This rising country music star is up for 5 Grammys

A month after performing a free concert in downtown Salt Lake to celebrate the Utah Hockey Club home opener, Shaboozey now has five Grammy nominations to his name.

Shaboozey came to Utah amid ‘A Bar Song (Tipsy)’ success

Hockey fans were treated to a free concert from Shaboozey outside of the Delta Center last month, a few hours before the Utah HC took on the Chicago Blackhawks, as the Deseret News previously reported.

The show came as Shaboozey enjoyed the longest No. 1 hit of the year and the third longest this decade, according to Billboard. At the time of his Utah appearance, the rising country music star had a No. 1 hit going on 13 weeks. “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” is still going strong on the charts, and is one of the biggest country hit of the 2020s.

Following the success of “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” Shaboozey, a Nigerian-American rapper and singer from Virginia, now has five Grammy nominations, per People:

• Best new artist

• Song of the year

• Best country solo performance

• Best melodic rap performance (for his role in “Spaghetii” on Beyonce’s country album, “Cowboy Carter”)

• Best country song

Who is Shaboozey?

It’s been a breakthrough year for Shaboozey. The 29-year-old artist, who is the child of Nigerian immigrants, created his stage name following his high school football coach’s misspelling of his actual name, Collins Chibueze, per Billboard.

Shaboozey gained significant traction when his blend of hip-hop and country was featured on Beyonce’s debut country album, “Cowboy Carter,” earlier this year, according to NPR.

Beyonce featured Shaboozey on two tracks — “Sweet*Honey*Buckiin’” and “Spaghettii,” which also featured Linda Martell, the first commercially successful Black female country music artist who is hailed as the “unsung hero” of the genre, per Martell’s website.

But Shaboozey’s recent success comes a few years after the artist entered the industry. “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” stems from his third studio album, “Where I’ve Been, Isn’t Where I’m Going.” The singer-songwriter released his first single, “Jeff Gordon,” in 2014, and his debut album in 2018.

Shaboozey was also featured in “Start a Riot,” a song from the “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse” soundtrack.

“I’ve been doing music for such a long time, I’ve put a lot of time and years into it,” Shaboozey told People. “I put so much into it that I feel like it’s just cool to see it working. Everybody hopes it works. To see it actually working, it’s unreal.”

Now, Shaboozey is at the top of the charts and in consideration for some major awards that could help continue the momentum in his career.

“This is the peak of the mountain as far as recognition comes,” Shaboozey told Billboard about his potential Grammy wins. “This is a longstanding ceremony, it’s history and tradition, and hopefully we’re able to take it home. That childhood fear of never winning anything is still there. It would mean the world to win one of these things, but if not, the year we had was crazy. If not now, it’ll come. We in the club now.”