Hayden Coffman, who recently released the Love And A Heartbreak album, has opened up about his journey to becoming a rising country star. It's refreshing, wholesome, and surprising.
Videos by Wide Open Country
When you hear that someone's dropped out of college to pursue any of the arts, your primary reaction may be of shock, concern, and/ or disappointment. Most indies get burnt putting their all into the music industry; very few make it through the other end.
Hayden Coffman is one of those one-in-a-million artists who walked that intrepid road.
When I had the pleasure of talking to Hayden Coffman ahead of his sophomore album release, he told me all about what he did before he found success as a country artist.
He started singing when he was in college playing baseball. A buddy of his started to take up guitar, and Coffman told him, "Hey man, I'll sing if you want to play guitar." At their age, they couldn't go into bars yet, so they sang and performed together to pass the time.
Then he started uploading covers to Instagram and other social media.
Hayden Coffman Managed To Pull Off An Internet Success Story
As his friends and family enjoyed his covers, he kept on throwing them up online, and after years of doing it, he found a deep appreciation for it. "I was like, hey, I'd rather do this than play baseball," he said, "I don't think I'm going to be able to play baseball as long as I think I can sing."
"I got very lucky. My family was very supportive of it, and was able to help me out financially, especially when I dropped out of college, and they were all for it." Now that's not something everyone can say after dropping out of college to chase after a dream.
They told him, "If you're gonna do it, do it. Go full in we've got your back... if that doesn't work out, you can always go back to college. You can't always be a country music singer." How refreshingly positive of them.
"A couple of years down the road, in 2021... I got lucky with 'Better Off,'" his ninth published single. He started producing original singles in 2019, but this was the one he credits as really pushing him out there when it went viral online.
From then on, he's been producing more music, attracting more fans, and going on ticketed tours.
Hayden Coffman went from dropping out of college for online covers to releasing an album he's proud of and being supported by hundreds of thousands. And it was possible thanks to his own grit and supportive family.
See? I told it was a refreshing and wholesome story.
