Long before platinum records and sold-out arenas, Collins Chibueze learned that success begins with credibility. From American football fields across his native Virginia to the early days of SoundCloud, nobody cared what you said you could do. They cared whether you showed up, competed, and improved.
That combination taught a work ethic. But Chibueze, professionally known as Shaboozey, found more in a man sporting ruffled shirts, high heels, purple suits, and a perm. For a young Black man trying to figure out who he was and who he could become, Prince wasn’t just a musician.
Prince was proof that success could live on the other side of conformity. Shaboozey stands a solid 6 feet 4 inches, weighs 235 pounds, and could pass for a professional athlete. Prince was 5-foot-3 and clocked in at a buck 15 at his heaviest. But Prince was a giant in platform shoes who gave outsiders permission to stay outsiders.
‘Once I found out about Prince, it opened up the whole entire world for me,’ the 31-year-old says. ‘Knowing that that person was successful, believe it or not, helped me be like, “Oh, I can do this.” I don’t have to conform to a certain thing that people think I should be.’
A mental breakthrough happened a couple of years after high school. Shaboozey was part of a collective of young Black musicians in Los Angeles who enjoyed a diversity of musical tastes, stretching from J Dilla and Ol’ Dirty Bastard to Prince, and watching artists embrace different inspirations showed him there wasn’t a single blueprint for Black creativity.
Shaboozey performs at the Macy’s 4th of July Fireworks 2026
Shaboozey grew up mostly on hip-hop and R&B on the radio. But his father always played country music at home and Shaboozey came to love it. And in a musical genre that often struggles to acknowledge artists who look like him, this American-born man of Nigerian parentage sticks out like…well, like a Black man at the top of the country charts.
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‘The most historically successful artists or the greatest ones – they stood outside the box,’ Shaboozey says, leaning back in his chair, face stoic, looking like he’s ready for a counterargument. He is battling purists passionate about what plays on country music stations: Country ain’t hip-hop, and hip-hop ain’t country.
Maybe not, but in their purest forms, they’re play cousins. Ol’ school hip-hop and country both expose the struggles of the working class – heartbreak, family, survival. They detail the grind of daily life and the resilience to endure it. One uses a guitar. The other uses turntables.
‘So I think a real key to ending my life as a legend – being one of the greats – is stepping outside the box and being brave when you do it,’ he says.
Understand that Shaboozey didn’t just advance the country/hip-hop debate. He settled it in 2024 with ‘A Bar Song (Tipsy)’. By the time the song spent 19 consecutive weeks atop the Billboard Hot 100 chart, rivaling Lil Nas X’s ‘Old Town Road’ five years earlier, deliberation surrounding Shaboozey’s place in country music felt increasingly outdated. Hip-hop was never a costume he put on. It lived alongside country from the beginning. The song didn’t blur genres so much as reveal how artificial the borders had always been.
Shaboozey played football in high school and now trains like an athlete, doing dynamic strength and agility moves.
Maintaining that uniqueness, however, requires a fierce kind of grounding. When you’re a broad-shouldered, lineage-carrying giant of a man toting the sudden, massive weight of country stardom, the Internet stops treating you like a human and starts treating you like a product. Your value gets measured more than your humanity.
Staying at number one for 19 weeks is a dream, but the fallout can be brutal. Between endless press gauntlets, TV appearances, and live shows, the pace is a recipe for burnout. Laurence Ng, Shaboozey’s Beverly Hills–based trainer, says the singer wasn’t fully conditioned for the relentless grind of overnight superstardom.
‘When we first started training two years ago, ‘Boozey was not in good shape,’ Ng says. ‘I feel like the last time he probably worked out with a trainer that knew what they were doing was, like, high school football.’
Shaboozey began at the bottom with Ng. He struggled to hold a 30-second plank, could barely do five push-ups, and had trouble jumping rope. Fast-forward to today? Shaboozey’s holding planks for 2 minutes 30 seconds. He’s pushing 550 pounds on a sled, jumping rope at warp speed. He looks the part every time he steps under the lights. He has more bounce. Main-character energy.
‘Whenever I’m physically at my best, or whenever I know that I’m consistent with my workouts, as soon as I step onstage, I know there’s a presence there,’ Shaboozey says. ‘The one thing I got to communicate with the most is my body. I love being in shape. I love being confident.’
Ng says that when Shaboozey is in town, Mondays are for upper-body pushes. Tuesdays shift to explosive, lower-body athletic movements, such as box jumps and heavy medicine ball work. By Wednesday, it’s upper-body pulls, pull-ups, and rows.
Even Thursdays, his ‘rest’ days, are active, spent conquering the steep inclines of the Los Angeles hills or logging rounds on the boxing bags. Fridays he becomes ‘somebody’s defensive end,’ Shaboozey says, laughing. He goes full-body athletic gauntlet, employing sled pushes, jump rope, sprints, and conditioning.
The grind doesn’t pause for a tour schedule. No gym? No problem. Ng ensures the high-energy vibe stays strong with mobile workouts that feature bodyweight sets in Shaboozey’s hotel room or wherever they pull up.
‘When he’s on tour, he’s doing workouts in the arena, outside of the tour bus – wherever,’ Ng says. ‘It’s just being very versatile and flexible and improvising different workouts for him.’
That schedule can be relentless – touring and promoting daily, stepping onstage night after night or arriving at the studio mentally prepared to create. The fitness benefits go far deeper than what the mirrors show. For Shaboozey, physical grit unlocks creative flow.
‘Everything in the day is better when you work out in the morning,’ he says. ‘Musical sessions come easy after training.’
Shaboozey isn’t just dropping tracks. He’s blending worlds. Case in point: The Outlaw Cherie Lee & Other Western Tales, a cinematic concept album dropping July 31 via his own imprint, American Dogwood. This isn’t a standard playlist. It’s a full-blown, multivideo Western compilation that tells a story from the jump.
Conforming to nobody and bucking the unwritten rules of staying in his lane, Shaboozey is disrupting the music industry. He’s also eyeing movie making, aiming to bring his pen to novels, scripts, and feature films. For a man who refused to let country music define him, he certainly isn’t going to let Hollywood do it either.
It all comes back to a core defiance.
‘Others might not see you the way you want to be seen,’ he says. ‘Just make sure you see yourself.’
Photographs: João Canziani
Styling: Anastasia Walker for The Only Agency
Styling Assistant: Brandon Yamada
Grooming: Ariane Victoria for The Only Agency
Location: Malibu Fitness, CA
Creative Director: Jamie Prokell
Visual Director: Sally Berman
Video Executive Producer: Dorenna Newton
Video Set Producer: Angel Lenise Pyles
Video DP: Danny Dwyer
Video Editor: Kyle Orozovich
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Milo Bryant, CSCS, is a California-based trainer and an award-winning journalist.
