Trevor Young goes from Seaford to SOJA

Six years ago, Trevor Young's life changed while attending a concert at Seacrets. And on Monday, he'll be back at the Ocean City, Maryland, club.

This time he'll be on stage with his Grammy-nominated reggae band SOJA with friends and family in the crowd.

The 31-year-old, who grew up in Seaford, now travels the world doing what he loves (playing music) while getting paid to do it (his lifelong dream.)

But it wasn't always that way.

Before befriending and joining SOJA following the group's 2010 Seacrets show, Young fronted Seaford-based band Chowderfoot.

Over its 10-year run, the rock/jam/reggae hybrid regularly played across the region and state, especially at Delaware's beaches, and released a pair of full-length albums.

The four-piece was filled with childhood friends; their first gig can be traced to playing their eighth-grade dance.

After toiling in Delaware for years, the band moved to Austin, Texas, for a year before disbanding in 2009. Young headed back to Delaware and found himself in a familiar place: crashing at his parents' home.

A few months after moving back in town, a friend told Young he had won a pair of tickets to see a band at Seacrets they were really into – SOJA.

They went early to the sold-out show and Young found SOJA frontman Jacob Hemphill before the concert, offering himself as a guitar technician and touting his experience on stage and his time working for Seaford Music.

Right before SOJA went on stage that night, Hempill went up to Young and told him the band had just had a 30-minute meeting. They decided Young should come to the after-party for a quick interview.

"At that point tin the night, I was like, 'I better stop drinking,'" says Young, who now lives in Nashville, Tennessee.

The interview went well and within a couple of weeks, he was member of the SOJA family.

Young was eventually given more responsibility and new titles, like monitor engineer and stage manager. And then in 2011, the band decided to add another player and chose Young, who is now the eight-piece band's lead guitarist.

He remembers well that first show on stage as part of the band, feeling a bit like a kid in a new school.

"I didn't put too many pedals out. I remember [Jacob] just saying, 'Nail all the music stuff. Any kind of showmanship or going crazy on stage -- you'll get to that point. Just make sure you nail all the songs,'" Young says. "I remember I was really nervous and concerned about what I was wearing. I was worried I was going to end up wearing something stupid."

Young's mother, Barbara, says she wasn't worried with her son hitting the road and touring the world as a rock 'n' roller.

"His personality has always allowed him to be just on the edge of disaster, but he's always been able to get out of it," says Barbara Young, who still lives in Seaford with Trevor's father, Robert. "He can definitely handle anything on his own. We've never been worried at all."

Following SOJA's 2012 album "Strength to Survive," their first for ATO Records, "Amid the Noise and Haste" was released in 2014 featuring Young on guitar with a co-writing credit on the song "Shadow."

The album reached No. 1 on Billboard's reggae charts and lost to Ziggy Marley's "Fly Rasta" for that year's Grammy Award for Best Reggae Album. A follow-up is set to be recorded this fall with a 2017 release expected.

While in Delaware this week, Young played a solo benefit show Memorial Day at Big Chill Surf Cantina near Rehoboth Beach ahead of SOJA's show at Seacrets Monday at 9 p.m. (Tickets are $35.)

It's their final concert before kicking off a 42-date nationwide amphitheater tour with Slightly Stoopid on June 15 – a tour that brings Young to well-known venues like Colorado's Red Rocks Amphitheatre and California's Greek Theatre, as well as Philadelphia's Festival Pier on Aug. 20.

Over the years, he's met and played shows with acts like 311, his favorite childhood band, Incubus and the Dave Matthews Band. (Matthews is a co-founder of ATO Records.) He's also played mega festivals like Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival, although the biggest show he's played was at the free Woodstock Festival Poland in 2013, which was attended by an eye-popping 500,000 people.

"I couldn't see where the crowd ended – anywhere," says Young, who only a few years prior was playing tiny venues with Chowderfoot like the old Coyote's in Seaford.

Young isn't the only one enjoying his wild ride, which lands him on Grammy Award red carpets and backstage with super-famous rockers. Robert and Barbara are enjoying it, too. After all, they have skin in the game.

They were the ones who gave Young rides to shows when he was too young to drive and hosted too many basement band practices and recording sessions to remember.

"It's been very exciting to watch all this change. We love every bit of it," says Barbara Young, a tax preparer who can be found wearing a SOJA T-shirt up front when watching her son play.  "And when I do taxes, sometimes people call up and say, 'I don't know her name, but we want Trevor Young's mother to do our taxes. It's definitely brought us some notoriety in the area"

Contact Ryan Cormier of The News Journal at rcormier@delawareonline.com or (302) 324-2863. Follow him on Facebook (@ryancormier), Twitter (@ryancormier) and Instagram (@ryancormier).

IF YOU GO

What: SOJA

When: Monday, June 6, 9 p.m.

Where: Seacrets, 117 W. 49th St., Ocean City, Maryland

Cost: $35

Information: seacrets.com