Today we’d like to introduce you to Burgess Williams.
Burgess, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
Well, it all started with playing football all my life up until after I graduated from high school, that’s where I developed the mentality I have when it comes to achieving a goal. At one point, there was nothing anybody could tell me, I had it my mind that I was going to make it to the NFL, somehow or some way, practice squad or special teams, I was determined. It wasn’t until I went to a combine that was held at the Houston Texans practice facilities that I received my first batch of offers to play at the collegiate level, but I had already gotten accepted into LSU for academics, which I never even saw myself going too. It was actually the morning of the combine that I received a sign from God that told me that I should go to LSU, so during the combine, I had already made up my mind that I was going to LSU and attempt to walk on, turning down 15 D2 and D3 offers to play at the next level.
Now my older brother, Bryce Williams, had been involved in the Houston hip hop scene since he was in middle school, producing and recording his own music and others in a studio that he created, eventually leading him to putting on his own concerts in high school, so I was always involved in some type of way, from being behind a camera to helping put together a stage for a performance. The summer before I left for LSU while training to walk on was when I began to get more seriously involved in the business scheme of things with music, making more moves with my bigger brother and being exposed to certain experiences with groups of people that you would consider high in status. After being backstage at a concert at the Revention Center, me and my brother made a pact in an IKEA parking lot that we were going to truly put our all into taking his music to the next level, and from there the work began.
My first semester as a freshman at LSU, I started promoting my brother’s music with my friends, we posted flyers of his EP all over on campus, on poles, buildings, even trash cans, anything we could stick paper on. We would wake up at like 4 or 5 in the morning on game days and plaster flyers everywhere. I also knew that if I could get greek life on his music, then it would have a better chance of spreading, that’s when I thought of the idea of contacting people that I went to high school with that were apart of greek life at their own colleges, in different states of course, to start promoting his music to their friends. Then one day, I attended a frat show that Sigma Nu put on and they had booked Juicy J to come perform, so everyone was talking about it, but you had to know somebody in the fraternity. I literally stood outside the fraternity house and kept attempting to get in until Tyren, who eventually became a good friend of mine and is Webbie’s nephew, pulled up in a Bentley, hopped out, and told me to come over to him, thinking I was somebody else. When I walked up, he realized I wasn’t who he was looking for, but then I explained to him who I was and asked if I could roll with him for the night and he agreed. Walking into that fraternity party, being in the green room and then behind stage, seeing Juicy J pull up and perform, I felt like I was in a dream. Then I found out how much they paid for everything and that’s when I had the epiphany to start booking my brother to perform at frat shows.
After that night, Tyren started showing me around LSU and Baton Rouge, introducing me to people like Duke Riley, Ben Simmons, and other prominent LSU athletes at the time, while also meeting some of the people in Trill Entertainment. Eventually, I caught word that another fraternity had booked Roscoe Dash for a frat show and I knew I had to get Bryce to open, so I started reaching out to everyone I knew in LSU Greek life to get a lead on a social chair, nothing worked, until I got on Facebook and found out the PIKES were putting on the whole thing. I messaged their Facebook page and pitched them booking Bryce to open, a couple of days went by and then finally, I got a response. I got him booked, but his DJ pulled out of making the show, so I had to find him a DJ the day before the show, resulting in me finding DJ BrenTaughtYou spinning at The 5 Dining Hall. Hearing one mix, I knew he was special and had a unique skill, so I reached out and got him solidified as Bryce’s official DJ. Leading up, we started making it “bigger than life”, on the day of the show, we pulled up and found out they were expecting over 1200 people in attendance. Now I always had intended to be behind the scenes as just the booking manager, but at soundcheck, my brother gave me the other mic and told me I was his hype man, leaving me with the worst anxiety and adrenaline rush I’ve ever experienced, but nonetheless, I stood up to the challenge and the show was a success. After that show, I knew my true purpose and why God had told me to go to LSU, I dropped pursuing walking onto the LSU football team completely and solely became encompassed with the entertainment business.
In December of 2015, we put together a tour run with us just hitting open mic nights and showcases called the “Texas Run It Up Tour”, only one was an official show that we put together with our money which was Dallas, yet it was when we were in Austin at an open mic night that I got the message from a college entertainment company called “I’m Shmacked”. Prior to the tour, I hatched up another idea to get Bryce on another big show that I’m Shmacked was doing at LSU that was apart of their college tour. I had all my friends in Greek life, clubs, or just regular students at LSU and back in Houston “@” I’m Shmacked’s twitter page, “Bring Bryce Williams to LSU!” What started as just a few people doing it, turned into hundreds of people doing it, and them telling strangers to do it, crashing their twitter eventually. So while we were wrapping up the night in Austin, I got a message from the owner of I’m Shmacked, Arya, about having Bryce headline the LSU tour stop. We turned around and headed to LSU and did the show with over 1000 people in attendance; we had never thought we could do that by ourselves with the level my brother was at, that’s when we got the offer to go on tour with I’m Shmacked. We went from performing at open mics and house parties for like 50 people to receiving a key to the city of Elizabeth, New Jersey by the mayor for having over 2300 people in attendance at the Ritz Theatre. After that tour, for the next four years, we began touring on our own, booking our own shows for solid rates, doing SXSW, spring break concerts in Mexico & summer concerts in Toronto, performing in arenas, opening for major artists like 21 Savage, Waka Flocka Flame, Lil Dicky, Madeintyo, 24hrs, A Boogie with tha Hoodie, Trill Sammy, Dice Soho, even iLoveMakonnen and Rich Homie Quan, the list goes on and on.
While doing all of this, I began to hatch more ideas of just how to build the brand bigger, so I came up with another idea of putting on my own music festival, what eventually became known as Tigerland Fest. The start of my junior year, I began to feel like I was limiting myself, so I branched out and was introduced to Xavier by our DJ, Bren, who came to me about trying to get in contact with Waka Flocka for a concert. I connected the dots for him and eventually got so involved that I solidified the venue, booked the artist, budgeted costs, created the layout of the festival and marketing behind it, got the production, and maintained operations from being point of contact for the artist to stage managing. The festival was a success with only three weeks of promotion, selling over 3,000 tickets in a two weeks span, even after having to reschedule due to Waka’s knee injury which took two months to heal. With the influence of that, DJ BrenTaughtYou and I began doing all the clubs and bars around LSU and Baton Rouge, soon leading to us doing events in the Louisiana region from Lafayette to New Orleans for the next two years. My last two years at LSU, while still working with my brother and DJ BrenTaughtYou, we collaborated with DJ CMix, LSU’s official DJ, doing events together and hyping his events up, eventually led to me being the sole MC for the opening set for T.I. at LSU’s PMAC Arena. I’ve crowd surfed before, but I never thought I would walk on top of a crowd, so when I did it, I didn’t know what to expect, my perspective and life in general had truly been changed. I had the same moment when I felt God was talking to me, telling me to go to LSU, have faith and just do it.
After that moment though, a week later or so, I got some pretty bad news that after doing my third SAP appeal, I was being thrown out of LSU because my GPA had dropped tremendously over the course of 4 years. I knew I wasn’t in good academic standing though because there would be times that I would purposely miss test days to go perform on the road, so I knew the day was coming, but it was the beginning of my senior year, so it just hit me different. After changing my major three times, I was out of school for a whole semester, driving for Lyft to pay bills and doing whatever I could to make money, from small events to doing major events for cheap. I began to question a lot and almost never went back to school, but after the death of my grandfather, Percy Vaughn, and learning more about his history in academics at Alabama State University, I was inspired to do better, so I turned my life around and got back into LSU miraculously.
The last year there, 2019 to 2020, DJ BrenTaughtYou and I went back to Tigerland and started running the bar circuit again, and eventually built up our repertoire with the bars, clubs, and LSU athletes again, from DJing and MCing LSU football players’ birthday parties to hosting the SEC Championship After Party at Mike’s in Tigerland. Once it was solidified that they were going to the Natty, we went to work on putting together an event in New Orleans for the game, getting all the bars in Tigerland to join together and co-sign our event which was held at the Red Eye Bar in downtown New Orleans, calling it “Tigerland in Nola”. We had everyone from NFLSU, to even Joe Burrow and the whole team in attendance. When that event was over, I began to focus on trying to graduate, so I began to get more involved with performance and acting at LSU’s Hopkins Black Box, doing shows for college credit towards my degree in Communications. There, I was selected for two Undergraduate Performance Showcases, two shows in which one became the first undergraduate directed performance and another in which it was the first all-black cast and collective to put on a workshop performance that was centered around the expression of “Blackness”, the first of its kind at LSU, a predominantly white institution.
Of course though, when the pandemic hit due to the COVID-19 virus, the rest of my semester was moved to online, so I moved back to Houston and graduated from LSU in May of 2020. Graduating during the pandemic wasn’t easy, I was once again confused on what to do with my life because I had trained and prepared myself to go into throwing concerts and festivals after college, but with social distancing being a thing now, gathering thousands of people in a space is now non-existent for the most part. I had to revamp myself and explore my options, that’s when I started looking into the nightlife in Houston and saw how certain bars and clubs were able to stay open, turning into restaurants with full menus. Capitalizing on that, we’ve now established some solid connections and have had some residencies going for periods of time, one for example was at Live Oak in the Greater Third Ward area. I’ve also recently got into podcasting with some of my closest friends and started a podcast called “The Glass Head Podcast” where we push the message that “Transparency is key!” We believe that if people were more transparent and honest with themselves and then with others, then the world be a better place.
We’re already starting our second season where we are beginning to interview creatives, artists, and other entrepreneurs. I’ve also started to get into radio and have created my own radio page called “BW Radio” where I have a playlist running on Apple Music and Spotify called “Heat of the Day”, keeping up with all the latest music and news in hip hop. For the future, I plan on starting my own management and marketing company called “Chase Matthew Marketing & Management aka CMM&M, which is already in the works, dealing with clients like PRO KiD, a producer out of Los Angeles who’s produced for 2 Chainz, Bryce Williams, Soulja Boy, Waka Flocka, Gudda Gudda, Riff Raff, and more. Another one is an underground artist out of Houston named Saga//Entity, a unique styled artist who has dropped songs called “Life’s a Drip” & “Saga Entity” on all platforms. Overall, my story is still being written and I’m excited to see where the journey goes from here.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Definitely has not been a smooth road, but no path to success is or will be. The first big obstacle was trying to get my parents behind the vision, they were really worried about me and my brother putting school on the line for a dream. It was two whole years before they began to come around and start showing support for us. The next was balancing college and trying to elevate in the entertainment industry at the same time. The way I saw it, it was no different then interning, for me, it was just ongoing, but for professors, they didn’t see it that way. I had to change my major three times before I made the move from business to humanities and social science, were in the Communications department, the professors were way more understanding about what I was trying to accomplish. Another obstacle was dealing with friends trying to understand why I wasn’t around as much or social as I was before, caught up with business and trying to maintain grades.
Eventually, leading to me being throw out of LSU was another challenge I had to overcome. Anxiety and depression was in full effect 24/7, I even had to go seek professional help because I emotionally checked out. Trying to get help was another issue for me, coming from the black community, mental health wasn’t the biggest topic to speak up about, so it was really hard allowing myself to open up in a vulnerable way to get the help I needed. Losing my grandfather was another big hill to climb, I wasn’t in his life as much as I wanted, so it weighed heavy on me, but when I learned the true family background and the real history behind him, it motivated me to become a better person overall. Lastly, graduating during a pandemic was not an easy task either, I, nor the whole world I would say, was ready for something like this. Not being able to have a real graduation and losing the opportunity to walk across the stage was something that really took me back, especially since I had completely put myself back together and gotten my mind right to get back into school and graduate. I guess I can say I’ve already walked or even skipped across hundreds of stages around the world, so I shouldn’t be too down about it.
We’d love to hear more about your work and what you are currently focused on. What else should we know?
In a way, I like to see myself as the business, like Jay-Z said, “don’t be a businessman, be the businessman.” I’m involved and do so many different things now that I’ve just pinpointed myself as a creative, underground mogul, entrepreneur. Specializing in communications of performance in acting, public speaking, MCing, managing, marketing, and even executive producing: I can go on and on. My notoriety definitely leans more on the MCing and managing side just because when you book over 75 plus events and MC them yourself, people start taking notice to that. Lately though, I would have to say I’ve been getting brand recognition from The Glass Head Podcast and MCing around Houston nightlife. What I’m most proud of is my ability to pivot my brand to where I don’t set a ceiling or box in myself to one thing, I make it very clear that you can’t label me as just one thing, and that is something I still astonish myself for being able to do. Lastly, what sets me apart from others is my consistency, I’m still climbing the ladder of success after experiencing so much setbacks, but that’s apart of the process: trusting the process. You have to have trust and confidence in yourself, I’ve come to find out that you’d be surprised by the outcome when you bet on yourself.
Is there a characteristic or quality that you feel is essential to success?
I’ve always been told that I have the ability to jump at opportunities without hesitation. Everything that I’ve done that was “not average” was always done with faith that “I’m supposed to be doing this.” I guess that’s where I get my “just do it like Nike” intentions from, so in all honesty, the most important quality or characteristic about myself that’s been extremely important to my success would be my faith in God’s plan for me. I know that the amount of blessings and opportunities that have come into my life is not out of coincidence; it’s solely due to me walking in the right direction.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://linktr.ee/BurgessChase
- Email: theburgesswilliams@gmail.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theburgesswilliams/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/theburgesswilliams/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/theburgessw/
- Other: https://linktr.ee/TheGlassHeadPodcast
Image Credit:
Jmari Wyatt (IG: @jmari.wyatt), Jordan Black (IG: @byjordanblack), Adam Vo (IG: @tvadv)
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