Singer-songwriter Marty Owens was raised in a rural village in the west of Ireland, where lessons were taught in the lush outdoors and stories were shared while sitting around the fireplace. At a young age, Owens was exposed first to traditional Irish music, learning to play instruments such as the bodhrán, tin whistle, and accordion while in school. He recalls his mother, who worked at a preschool, spinning Merle Haggard and George Jones while she’d drive him to soccer practice. It was also his mother who had a cabinet full of vinyl, cassette tapes and videos of the Eagles and numerous others performing. “Listening to ‘Peaceful Easy Feeling’ was the first time I got chills from music,” Owens said – a feeling he’s been chasing ever since.
At 12 years old, he was gifted a drum set for Christmas, and began teaching himself how to play. “At that time, I was really inspired by classic rock music, and would play along to Guns & Roses and AC/DC,” he said. In the coming years, Owens caught his first taste of playing live in front of an audience when he and his best friends created a band and started playing local gigs.
Soon after, they were booking shows beyond their hometown, and Owens finally had a glimpse of what a career in music might look like, although the colors to paint it seemed to be just beyond his grasp. “Making a career out of music was never something I thought to be possible. At first it was just something I loved to do. As I began playing and singing more, it became something I craved.”
Amidst a budding love for performing, his natural talent for soccer earned him the chance to represent Ireland, with a U15 National squad call up. By 18 he had signed a professional contract with Sligo Rovers F.C. By 21, the singer’s path was diverging. He earned a scholarship to play the sport overseas at Cumberland University in Lebanon, TN, only 30 minutes from Nashville’s neon glow. Although soccer consumed his life in the following years, living in a city flooded with music sparked a renewed recognition of his dream. The singer put pen to paper, crafting his own lyrics and telling his own stories for the first time. Over the years he was able to share those songs on smaller stages around town and eventually connected with producer Alexander Frieden, who helped Owens finally bring his songs to life.
The slowed down way of living and the cherished simplicity of his upbringing are woven into the songs Owens writes today. The result is a pairing of clear-cut vocals, perfectly balanced production, and poetic lyrics that grip listeners at the forefront of the song and hold tight until the very end. Now, as the serendipitously full circle turn of events brought him to the very city of the music he was raised on, Owens is equipped with his own batch of songs — set to release this year. His ultimate goal? To give his listeners the same hair-raising emotion that he first got from the Eagles and the many artists he’s grown to love through the years.