Back at the end of 2022, Mackenzy Mackay celebrated reaching 10,000 followersonInstagramby posting a snippet of a new song he was working on. Filmedagainst a white brick wall and featuring nothing but Mackay’s soulful vocal andsome plaintive piano chords, it was a clip of a track called Venus. It was only 34seconds long but it sent the York-born, Scottish-raised 29-year-old into a wholenew realm.The world suddenly woke up to this startling singer-songwriter who could meldurgent, hip-hop-style delivery with a rich, emotional croon. His socials wentcrazy. Within a week, 10k followers became 100k. Rabid new converts wereeager to know when the full version of Venus would be released and thenumbers kept going up: 200k by January, 300k by March.Soon he was matching his online rise with success the old-school way, hittingthe road, the venues getting bigger with every tour, his diehard fans packing outrooms and singing his words back to him. Under two years since playing his firstever live show at the Troubadour in 2023, this year he sold out London’s 2,300-capacity O2 Forum. His songsdocument relationships, making sense of life inyour twenties and sticking to your dreams even when everyone tells you to snapout of it. They have connected on a huge scale–he’s already amassed over 250million streams.
