Wether you know his name or not, Dakota Striplin has been in the music scene for roughly 6 years. The New Zealand born emerging artist is back with a stunning track — in which he worked on with content creators, Ryan Trahan and Haley Pham.

Though collaborating with them to this stunning new track and video, Dakota has established his audience from being on The Voice: Australia, as well as Season 12 of America’s Got Talent. Striplin made it to the judge cuts, where, unfortunately, he was cut. That is when he decided to continue chasing his dream, auditioning for The Voice: Australia’s eighth season, where he joined Kelly Rowland’s ream.

We caught up with Dakota to talk where he is now, collaborating with Ryan and Haley, next moves, and more.

PopWrapped (PW): ‘See You In Austin’ is a ballad based around the engagement of popular content creator, Ryan Trahan and his now fiancee Haley Pham. How did this song come about? & was this track brought to you by Ryan or was this a track you had previously started working on?

Dakota Striplin (DS): Ryan held an Instagram live talent show that I saw and entered. I made it in to the first round and played an original song with an extra verse I wrote for them. When I made it in to the 2nd round I thought how could I write something that would mean a lot to them. So I set out to write a song about their relationship and that turned in to “See You In Austin”. They loved the song so much that Ryan texted me about recording the song and releasing it and told me about the upcoming engagement etc. so from there we just planned everything out.

PW: The official music video is a simple video documenting their journey as a couple but also includes small parts with you, as well. How long did it take to come up with the concept for the video, as well as the execution, filing, etc?

DS: So after getting the song recorded here in Nashville, we made a plan to release the song and a music video. I released the song on the Sunday after their proposal video was posted then filmed the music video on Monday. It was finished by Friday and posted to their Traphamily channel. The idea for the video was pretty simple and I had an awesome team from Colling Films help make the video happen. 

PW: You had a large audience before this collaboration but now an even larger group of eyes on you after the collaboration with them. That has to not only be a blessing, but quite nerve wracking. What is next for you? And how do you plan to go upcoming releases?

DS: I had a few followers from being on The Voice in Australia previously but since writing “See You In Austin” and being associated with Ryan and Haley, I’ve had so many amazing people reach out and show their support for my music and it’s been such a massive blessing. This song has created opportunity for me here in Nashville as I’m meeting with some record labels and publishers in the coming month. Depending on how those meetings go, I’ll be releasing some more music in the next few months. 

PW: ‘See You In Austin’ is one of your most popular tracks across major music platforms. How does it feel to know so many people are streaming a song that holds such a power message to it? & not only are they streaming it, but the feedback on social media is fantastic.

DS: It’s honestly so crazy to me that people are listening to my song. I can’t thank Ryan and Haley enough for giving me a platform to share my music. My Team (Jason Deere and Silvio Richetto) helped me get the song done so fast and so professionally too. Couldn’t have done it without them! The song reached 200k stream on just Spotify in its first 2 weeks and was added to the “Country Chill” Spotify curated playlist. If you told me a month ago that all of this would be happening I wouldn’t believe you. The support from everyone means the absolute world! 

PW: What can we expect from you in the months to come? Do you have any dream collaborations you would like to accomplish? If so, who?

DS: Moving forward, I’ll be continuing to write and record. Hopefully I’ll be signing a record deal soon and releasing some more of my music. My dream collaboration right now would be to write a song with Julia Michaels. You gotta dream big. I said to my wife over a year ago after watching one of Ryan’s videos that I was going to be friends with him one day and now we have this project together and I’ll be travelling to Austin to play the song at their wedding. So I guess what I’m trying to say is, work hard and good things will come! 

Dakota Striplin’s new track, “See You in Austin” is out now on all major music platforms. You can also watch the official music video for the track in this article, or on The Traphamily’s Youtube channel. Be sure to follow Dakota’s journey on social media and YouTube.