Jackson Dean gives his all when he is performing. So much so, that the singer says he sometimes blacks out when he is on stage.
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"I'll push so hard sometimes, that I literally black out — like when you stand up too quick," Dean tells People.
"Last time I had it happen, I spent an entire verse in the dark," he adds. "Your body's still going, and you're like ... hell, yeah!"
Dean was athletic growing up. His passion for winning, and giving whatever he is doing 100 percent, started in sports, long before he discovered music.
"I was not a pretty boy," Dean admits. "I was not going to catch the ball. I was trying to kill the ball. It was a clash every frickin' play."
Now, the 24-year-old feels the same about how he performs as he did playing sports in high school.
"When you step on the stage, there's the clash of all these sounds coming together, flying through the air, going into somebody else's body," Dean says. "And you're making that. You are that. You're in the clash. It's just a wild, wild feeling. It's a thing to be engulfed by. You can literally feel the ground shake. It's so fun. It's so, so, so, so fun."
Jackson Dean's "Heavens To Betsy"
Dean currently has a Top 30 hit with "Heavens To Betsy." The song is from his most recent album, On the Back of My Dreams, released last September. By his own admission, Dean never planned on releasing it as a single.
"I started playing that song to kill time on radio tour," Dean shares. "I'd be like, 'Here's another one that I wrote, and you're probably not going to like it, but I'm going to play it anyway because it's good.'"
Dean might not have planned on releasing it as a single, but it has had an unexpected response, including saving lives.
"I was at a show one time, and I can't remember where it was," Dean shares. "But I had this guy come up to me, and he grabs me by the shoulder. I was like, 'Hey man, what's up?' And he goes, 'There's a couple of your songs that changed my life, man. I thought about ending it and you pulled me back from the dark.' That was the first time I was like, 'Wow.' And then it happened again, and then again. And I was like, 'Alright, I guess I'm doing something right.'"
