Michael Ray Details

When rising country singer Michael Ray made his first exploratory trip to Nashville, he got a life-

changing piece of advice from an industry insider.

Go home.

“He said, ‘Don’t move. The way the music industry’s going to become, you’re not going to be

able to get a record deal just doing a showcase anymore. You’ve got to bring something to the

table,’” Ray said. “He said, ‘I want to you to go back to Florida, grab a band and become the

biggest you can be in Florida on your own, and then I want you to come back.’ So I put a band

together of friends of mine and we started to play.”

Turns out it was the best thing Ray ever did. He built a rowdy fan base tilling the same fertile

Southeastern soil Jason Aldean and Luke Bryan used to start their careers and returned to

Nashville three years later to claim a record deal, a publishing contract and a few unexpected

opportunities along the way.