In the last seven months, Dan Smyers and Shay Mooney of Dan + Shay have won a Grammy Award, Billboard Music Award and three ACM Awards (Dan scored two additional ACM Awards for writing/producing). They also notched a four-week No. 1 on the Billboard Country Airplay chart with “Speechless,” which marked their 5th career No. 1 single. Their new single, “All to Myself,” is currently No. 7 on the chart.
The duo is currently on the road as part of Florida Georgia Line’s Can’t Say I Ain’t Country Tour through September, before joining Shawn Mendes for a seven-date trek through Australia this fall.
While it would be easy for the duo to get caught up in their accomplishments and awards during this whirlwind year, Shay Mooney says they keep things in perspective thanks to a little advice from Lady Antebellum’s Charles Kelley.
“You know, especially being in a duo, it’s a little easier to kind of remind each other of how cool this is that we get to do this,” says Shay. “But it’s been a crazy journey, you know? We’ve both been working at this for a really long time, even before Dan + Shay happened. I remember Charles Kelley telling us one time . . . he was like, ‘Man, enjoy the moments that you have, every single moment, because if it does happen for you, it happens so quickly that everyone around kind of sees you one way and you’re just still there keeping your head down like, “What just happened? How in the world did this happen?” And, you kind of miss the moments.’ Dan and I try to take it day-by-day and really appreciate everything that we get to do.”
photo by Tammie Arroyo, AFF-USA.com