Who Is Drake Milligan? The Story Behind His Journey to Country Music

We love sharing new artists that we believe in with you all! Today, we get to introduce singer-songwriter, Drake Milligan. The rising new artist is hard to not love! With music coming out this week and a true love for music, Milligan is an artist that will appeal to fanbases across the country genre.

Growing up in Fort Worth, Texas, music was definitely a part of the landscape of the singer’s childhood. “My first introduction to music was probably my dad’s records,” he tells us. “He would always have some great CDs in his car. Alan Jackson records of course.” Milligan’s father introduced him to traditional country artists that remain a staple in his influences today. The artist credits greats like George Jones, Merle Haggard, and George Strait as some of his top picks in the country realm.

Milligan fell in love even more with music in general, when he was just a young kid. “At 7 years old, I discovered Elvis,” he begins, “I learned all I could about music and decided I wanted to be an entertainer like him.” As fate would have it, Milligan ended up playing Elvis on CMT’s show ‘Sun Records’ later in life.

Despite his love for the entertaining side of music, Milligan had bigger dreams and untapped potential that was soon to be recognized. “I always kinda wanted to be a rockstar. I had papers in 2nd grade about what you wanted to be when you grew up and it was always rockstar or something like that.”

The Turning Point:

Upon moving to Nashville, Tennessee, Milligan’s dreams became more attainable. “I was lucky enough to get in the room with some of my favorite writers in Nashville,” he recalls, adding later that one of the first people he met in town was legendary producer, Tony Brown. “Tony definitely helped me find my voice […] Originally when I came to town, I definitely wasn’t planning on being one of those guys that writes everything.”

Interestingly enough, it was through songwriting that Milligan finally honed in on his natural-born talent. Surrounding himself with the right team of people, the singer was able to tap into a unique perspective as a singer-songwriter, melding old-school country music with some modern-day flair of influences like Cody Johnson and Dierks Bentley.

“I found myself going back more than I do going towards new music. Discovering stuff from artists that were recorded in the 60s that I never heard,” shares Milligan recalling the process of really honing in on his own style as an artist. After a few years of writing every day, the singer felt comfortable enough to co-write original music.

Today:

Nowadays, Milligan is anticipating the release of his debut self-titled EP. The record comes out this Friday (7/23). It features five original songs, all co-written by the singer himself. “It was really through co-writing and Brandon Hood, to his credit, really helped me try to hone in on finding my voice through storytelling,” shares Milligan about the process of writing the record. “There’s a lot of those songs where you can hear a lot of those influences.”

Milligan also shares how effortlessly the record came together. “It’s just being around good guys and getting to know them and their stories, it’s one of my favorite parts and by the end of the day, hopefully after a bunch of stories and some good times, we have a song.”

Of course, it is impossible to pick a favorite off the project, but the singer did share that the ballad, “Don’t Look Down” is one of his favorites to perform. “I miss melodies in music quite a bit,” shares Milligan. “We went for it… we didn’t hold back!” Other songs that fans can anticipate on the record are “Over Drinkin’ Under Thinkin’” and “She.”

With the EP release coming soon, the singer cannot wait for fans to hear everything and hopefully get to play songs live real soon. The singer already has some shows lined up and shares that he is still writing every day. It is a very exciting time for the budding artist! Congrats to Drake Milligan!

Check back here on Friday, July 23rd for a full review of the music and on Tuesday, July 27th, check back for a very special performance + interview from Drake Milligan live from New York City.

Connect:

To keep up with Drake Milligan, follow him on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

Check out new recently released tunes on our ‘New Country Music’ playlist. Be sure to give the playlist a follow for your weekly new country music fix.