What Shaboozey’s “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” is really about

With more than 10 weeks at the top of the charts, Shaboozey’s “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” may be the breakout hit of the year. At just under three minutes, the guitar-forward song manages to transport listeners to a local dive bar, where they sip on something strong with the artist. Here’s the story behind the song:

“A Bar Song (Tipsy)” started off as a 2004 hit

Twenty years before “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” hit the airwaves, rapper J-Kwon released his song “Tipsy,” an ode to club buzz. Shaboozey’s song is an interpolation of J-Kwon’s, but instead of being about having fun at the club, his song is a more grounded song about washing away your worries in a bar, with lines like “This 9 to 5 ain’t workin’, why the hell? Do I work that hard?” It’s about a party, yes, but also about letting off steam after a long day.

“I’ve been wanting to flip a song from the 2000s for a while,” Shaboozey shared Billboard. “I just said, ‘Everyone at the bar is getting drunk,’ and then we said, ‘Oh, sh-t!’ The producer picked up the guitar and started playing the chords, and then we started writing, just having fun and being creative.” (The main hook in J-Kwon’s song goes, “Everyone in the club is getting tipsy.”)

“We like to record gang vocals and have all our friends sing stuff,” he revealed Rolling stone. “I think the more energy and the more people you put on a song, the more it is felt, adding that the recording session “definitely became a party towards the end of the song, which is a good sign.”

RELATED: What Toby Keith’s Sassy Hit ‘As Good as I Once Was’ Is Actually About

Who is Shaboozey?

The Nigerian-American musician grew up in Woodbridge, Virginia, a suburb of Richmond. He released his first album, Lady Wrangler, in 2018, but it wasn’t until Beyoncé heard him perform “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” which was still unreleased, that he got his biggest break.

She asked him to play on two songs from her album Cowboy Carterand Shaboozey (real name Collins Obinna Chibueze) took advantage of the rise in visibility and dropped his second album, Where I’ve been is not where I’m going, shortly afterwards Cowboy Carter‘s release.

He told it Esquire that he doesn’t talk about his personal life.

RELATED: What the Lyrics to Malone & Blake Shelton’s “Pour Me a Drink” Really Mean

Shaboozey’s 2024 PCCA Nominations

The artist has been nominated in no fewer than seven categories at the 2024 People’s Choice Country Awards: The New Artist of 2024; The album of 2024; The Song of 2024, the Male Song of 2024 and the New Artist Song of 2024 for “A Bar Song (Tipsy)”; The 2024 music video for “Let It Burn”; and The Crossover Song of 2024 for “My Fault” featuring Noah Cyrus.

The 2024 People’s Choice Country Awards will air live on NBC and can be streamed on Peacock on Thursday, September 26, 2024 at 8/7c.