Aaron Young talks about his path to music ahead of his Saturday night show at the Tank Room

Aaron Young, who performs as AY Musik, might be familiar to plaza-goers as the keyboard playing, singing, rapping street performer with the giant smile. Yet there’s a lot more than busking to his young performer, who has opened up for the wildly disparate likes of Aaron Carter and T-Pain, and has nurtured a relationship with the Midwest Music Foundation that resulted in a trip to South by Southwest and a featured MyStoryKC video.

We recently sat down with Young to talk about his experiences with MMF, recording, fatherhood and the illusions of television stardom ahead of his show at the Tank Room on Saturday night.

The Pitch: I saw that you got to go to Austin this Spring.

Young: Yes – I did South by Southwest! For the first time ever. It was cool, super cool. I didn’t get a chance to do it the way I will next year, which is to bring what is me and what I was doing last year, which was called the My Battery tour. I didn’t get a chance to [street perform] every day like I wanted to on Sixth Street – which would be crazy!

Being on the plaza or places around here, you gotta draw people in and get the crowd later in the day. Sometimes you get a big crowd, sometimes not. But at South by Southwest, it’s just thousands of people, just walking. I can’t wait to do it next year. I’ll figure it out, talk to all the security people. But it was fun to be around all of the bands from Kansas City and have that honor. I think Rhonda Lynn was the person that made that happen for me, from MMF.

Can you tell me more about your relationship with Midwest Music Foundation? You were recently featured in one of their MySongKC videos.

It was kind of random. It first started not too long ago. At the time I was performing every day – I did a show every day for about three months, and at one of those shows I met someone who worked at MMF. He liked one of my songs, “Say Hey,” and he told me about a CD they do for the Midwest Music Foundation so artists can get seen. Next thing I knew, I was on the CD with Katy Guillen and the Girls, and all kinds of different great acts from Kansas City right now. That was just the beginning. Then came South by Southwest, they helped pay a medical bill, they shot that video. So supportive.

What did that mean to you to have this relationship with MMF?

Obviously, it meant a lot in my personal life. They really helped take care of me. I put everything I have into this. Last summer, like I said, I was performing every single day for two, three, four months. Eight to 10 hours a day, I’m performing somewhere. That’s how I thought I could say hey – so it means a lot. I’ve had a lot of ups and downs in my career, and there have been a lot of things that have gotten me to where I am now. So looking back and seeing how much I’ve grown and being able to do my music and having the right reaction and having someone there seeing it and saying “I want to help this person as an artist and a musician,” that means a lot. I’m thankful for those experiences.

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I also saw you in a Wendy’s commercial! Did you audition for that, or how did that happen?

Well, I’m signed to I & I, a modeling agency here in Kansas City. That was just kind of a spur-of-the moment offer, not through my music, which sucks, but hey. I’ve done so much on TV that’s just never aired. It’s so weird… I never expected it to air. So last summer, MTV came and shot us for the My Battery tour on the Plaza and they put us in a Made episode and used my music as the soundtrack, or on X Factor last summer, when I got four “yeses” at the Sprint Center. I did those things and they never aired, but this one did, and it was cool! I don’t know. It was just through referral, and I ended up trying something no one had tried. And it [the sandwich he tried in the commercial] was really hot!

Are you recording any music right now?

I have been recording for a while now. I have been working on this album. It’s my first album. To be honest, it will be about five years since I started making music. It’s the journey of life itself. When it’s all said and done, it will have a little bit of something, hopefully, that everyone can relate to.

5 years. You’re pretty young – 23, right?

I guess I’m not that old, huh. [Laughs.]

Well, that’s not to say that it isn’t a time in your life when a lot of stuff happens. It is.

I’m going through a lot. I have a child now. And the ups and downs of almost being something, and then not. It’s been a road. Having a child helps a lot with the writing process. It’s motivational… He’s almost two, and been around music his entire life. He’s actually turning into a crazy good drummer.

Can he keep a beat?

Yes, he can! It’s insane. So who knows what he’ll be someday.

Do you have a sense of when your record will be done?

I finished all the vocals for the record. The music – I think people will really enjoy the instrumentation. It’s somewhat what you’ll hear with Mumford and Sons or the Lumineers. Pop-ish, folk-ish, country-ish. It’s a lot of stuff! I’m not exactly sure when I’m going to release. Either top of the year or March 2016. The problem is, wherever I go, my music is received well by crowds, but the branding isn’t there. It has to be done. I’ve opened up for these national acts – Shaggy, Aaron Carter, T-Pain, and when you don’t have that branding and cohesiveness, then yeah, you can have a live show, but you don’t build the fanbase you want. So I want to focus on that while recording and working on the record. I’ve been working on it for five years, so I’m not in a hurry. 

See AY perform this Saturday, May 9, at the KKFI’s annual Spring Dance fundraiser at the Tank Room along with My Brothers and Sisters, the Late Night Callers, the Marching Cobras and more. Details here.

He will also appear at next weekend’s annual Troost Festival. Details here.