{"id":224101,"date":"2025-06-29T13:40:16","date_gmt":"2025-06-29T13:40:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/224101\/"},"modified":"2025-06-29T13:40:16","modified_gmt":"2025-06-29T13:40:16","slug":"edinburgh-dads-new-career-after-going-viral-on-facebook-by-chance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/224101\/","title":{"rendered":"Edinburgh dad’s new career after going viral on Facebook ‘by chance’"},"content":{"rendered":"

A working class Edinburgh dad-of-two has told how he won’t listen to the doubters as he continues on his journey to country music<\/a> stardom.<\/p>\n

Sean Mearns, 40, from Clermiston, is father to his two boys, Robbie, 10, and Luke, five, and husband to wife Kerri, 36, and has already had his music played on UK radio stations.<\/p>\n

Working as a maintenance worker, he has told how he is aiming for the stars after a chance Facebook Live has led to him eyeing up a 12-night-run, playing country music classic for 6,000 Fringe festival goers.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/b> Granddaughter of major Edinburgh film star dating Scottish footballer<\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/b> Edinburgh walk in honour of young woman murdered by evil boyfriend<\/a><\/p>\n

Sean, who specialises in Scottish, Irish and American country music, is hoping his own journey can inspire others to follow in his footsteps.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt all started four years ago when I felt like I was just plodding along in life,\u201d he said. \u201cI felt my brain was wasting away so I decided to learn how to play the guitar and got some lessons.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI started playing in the snug in my house and went from there,” he said. “My brother Jamie had his 40th in Liverpool and his pal Dennis (DelBhoy) came along.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn the minibus he was playing away and my brother and his mates goaded me on to give it a go. I sang Callum Beattie’s ‘Salamander Street\u2019 and everyone loved it.<\/p>\n

\u201cDennis was blown away and asked my story but I said I just play in my room and mind my own business. Little did I know my brother had Facebook Live\u2019d me and my wife told me it was everywhere back home.<\/p>\n

\u201cDennis asked me to come see him when I was home but I thought nothing of it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Sean<\/p>\n

Sean is hoping to achieve his dreams.<\/p>\n

Sean moved on with his life and continued to play for himself until he saw some sage advice he offered to his Robbie rebounded back at him. It was at this point the dad thought he had nothing to lose.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy boy Robbie was playing footy but was doubting himself,\u201d he said. \u201cI told him he’s amazing and he is doing the right thing and back himself.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen he turned to me and called me out. \u2018How about you back yourself too dad.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cSo we agreed I\u2019d go see Dennis and he\u2019d crack on with his football and we\u2019d both smash it. That has been the deal ever since.\u201d<\/p>\n

With the help of Dennis, Sean got out gigging, and he dived in deep playing in front of 120 people in the Midyoken pub. Two and a half years later, he has not looked back.<\/p>\n

\"Sean<\/p>\n

Sean will perform in front of thousands at the Grand Lodge.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe difference between me and other people, a lot folk talk a good game, but I just do it. My motto is we go big or we go home.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t shy away from anything and when the opportunity came to perform at the Grand Lodge on George Street during the Fringe, I jumped at it. We will be performing in front of 500 people a night for twelve nights, hopefully selling 6,000 tickets.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will be doing a Country Music All-Stars show, playing classic covers from over the years.\u201d<\/p>\n

As a working class resident of the capital, Sean notes people from his community often do not see the Fringe as for them, but he sees no reason why that should be the case.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a mindset it is not for us, but why not?\u201d, he said. \u201cI started off doing covers but then I recorded my first single \u2018She wanted him\u2019 with Dennis.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy music started taking off, I\u2019ve had 60,000 streams, and 100,000s of views on TikTok. It was surreal getting comments from people in America loving the music.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy family have also been amazing, they are just embracing what I am doing, even though they are a bit shocked. No one was expecting me to go down this route.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is definitely picking up momentum, folk are stopping me in town and asking for a picture. After the Fringe show I\u2019ll probably look to do a Scottish tour.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sean said he often meets older men in pubs who live with regrets they did not pursue their dream and he details how he does not want to be one of them.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you have a passion for something you want to do, go and do it,\u201d he said. \u201cNo regrets and I say that to my sons.<\/p>\n

\"Sean<\/p>\n

Sean was encouraged by his eldest son Robbie to follow his dream.<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes you have to take a big step and it is easy for others to judge. As Scottish folk we like to knock people who try things, but we should support them, and let people thrive.<\/p>\n

\u201cLife is too short. There is a stigma around failure but why can\u2019t we succeed?\u201d<\/p>\n

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Sean is also keen to give back with the maintenance man regularly playing free shows at nursing homes and charities.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just an hour of my time and sometimes it makes their day or even their week.\u201d<\/p>\n

To explore Sean\u2019s music visit his Facebook here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A working class Edinburgh dad-of-two has told how he won’t listen to the doubters as he continues on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":224102,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8816],"tags":[748,41751,1102,88457,4884,712,88458,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-224101","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-edinburgh","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-country-music","10":"tag-edinburgh","11":"tag-facebook-live","12":"tag-great-britain","13":"tag-scotland","14":"tag-sean-mearns","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114766940038309452","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/224101","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=224101"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/224101\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/224102"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=224101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=224101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=224101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}