Shaboozey stopped byThe Tonight Show to showcase his country single, “A Bar Song (Tipsy).” The track comes off the musician’s recent third album, Where I’ve Been, Isn’t Where I’m Going, which dropped in May.
On the late-night show, Shaboozey brought along his live band to perform the number on a bar-themed set, complete with neon cowboy signs. He encourage the audience to sing along to the group vocals that comprise the hook-laden chorus.
“A Bar Song (Tipsy)” was built around J-Kwon’s 2004 hit “Tipsy” and pays homage to artists like Pharrell Williams and Zach Bryan. He recently told Rolling Stone he wanted the song to channel the liveliness of a packed dive bar by bringing in friends to layer on vocals. “We love incorporating gang vocals and all our friends singing things,” the musician said. “I think the more energy and the more people you put on a song, the more it’s felt.”
As a rapper, singer, and producer, Shaboozey has been toying around with the boundaries of hip-hop and country. It’s what made his two appearances on Beyoncé’s similarly genre-bending album Cowboy Carter — on “Spaghettii” and “Sweet Honey Buckiin” — a perfect fit.
In a review of Shaboozey’s new LP Rolling Stone‘s David Browne wrote that the musician “comes across like someone raised on country who also appreciates hip hop. In doing so, he’s effectively changed the game. Cowboy Carter (where he made two cameos) lobbed the first volley in redefining and modernizing country, but Shaboozey’s second album is a full-on barrage of all those possibilities.”
