If anyone wonders if Army veteran Scotty Hasting is happy to be here, they just need to take a look at his forehead. He often wears a black cap with GRATEFUL spelled out in big white letters. This is what he feels after nearly losing his life in Afghanistan and finding a new one as a performer and recording artist.
With powerful and patriotic songs like "I'm America," "Til the Last Shot's Fired" and his latest single, "Scars," Hasting is something of a sensation in country music circles and an inspiration to many of his fellow veterans. These are things he never could have fathomed as he lay horribly wounded by 10 bullets from an enemy rifle more than 14 years ago.
The hat came from a friend who owns a clothing company; he wanted to design one specifically for Hasting and shipped him an example, not realizing he'd already hit the mark.
"I told him, 'Man, this is exactly it,'" says Hasting. "I'm beyond grateful to be here living, much less being able to do things that I never thought possible. If there's something that almost dying teaches you, it's that life is precious and you're not guaranteed a tomorrow."
Hasting's Tragedy in Afghanistan
Hasting's story nearly ended in April 2011 when he was deployed with the 1st Infantry Division's 4-4 Cav. He was scanning for mines and explosive devices in Kandahar when a Taliban solider opened fire at close range from behind a wall and struck Hasting in the shoulder, hip, and thigh.
He lived to not only tell the story but to sing about it, which is pretty miraculous when you consider that he'd hardly even picked up a guitar until COVID-19 struck just over five years ago.
Hasting had suffered nerve damage in his right hand as a result of his injuries and was also dealing with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, depression, and anxiety.
Competing in archery with the U.S. Paralympics program for several years was great physical therapy for him and gave him rewarding opportunities to travel and interact with other vets, he says, but all of that ended with the shutdowns related to the pandemic.
Left at home with not a lot to do, his mind kept wandering back to what it meant to have been injured so severely. Besides losing feeling and function in most of his right hand, he also lost his dear friend, Adam Hamilton, exactly one month after Hasting was shot.
Something else that was dwelling heavily on Hasting's mind was a question: What was he going to do next in life? After all, he’d expected to make the Army his career.
Picking up a Guitar
For a long time, Hasting had a budget-brand acoustic guitar leaning against a wall in his bedroom. He'd wanted to learn to play it, but just never did. Isolated at home during the pandemic, he finally focused his attention on it while pulling up lessons on YouTube.
"It was just a cheap beginner guitar (made by Mitchell), and I thank God I had it," he says. "I think my dad got it for $100, and I had it in the corner of my room since I was a kid. I had always wanted to learn to play it, but I always gave up on it because it was so hard, and I just went back to playing sports."
Because he lived in Nashville already, Hasting was able to find some job prospects not far from home. But besides his budding talent, his new dream coming true required a hefty amount of persistence.
He bought a better guitar, a Taylor, and headed downtown. Eventually he made some key connections, including Gordon Kerr and Doug Johnson from an independent record label called Black River Entertainment. In the meantime, he was pounding the pavement like countless other country music wannabees before and since.
Scotty Hasting Making It Happen in Music City
"Once Nashville started opening up again, I walked up and down Broadway for a month every day going in doors and bugging the crap out of people until they put me on stage," he says. "Eventually, I was playing five to six nights a week."
Those who gave him a chance may have been drawn in by his tenacity, or it could have been the soulful and heartfelt style that he developed singing '90's-style country.
He still loves performing classics like "Friends in Low Places" and "Should've Been a Cowboy," but these days he brings to life material that draws from his own unforgettable experiences.
To that end, he is working with established songwriters, including his producer, Johnson. The single "Scars" relates his story of perseverance while a previous release, "How Do You Choose," addresses the troublesome issue of survivor's guilt.
He also has recorded a killer version of John Fogerty's "Fortunate Son," which he performed in July at the Grand Ole Opry and considers a salute to Vietnam-era veterans.
How Scotty Hasting Resonates With Other Wounded Vets
That message he wears so prominently on his hat comes through clearly in a conversation with Hasting. Now that he's able to reach so many others through his music, his desire is that the positive turnarounds he's made in his own life will be inspiring to others with similar emotional challenges.
"I hope that I'm showing them that there's so much more out there and that they don't have to be defined by the bad," he says. "You can continue to push forward and be successful and become defined by what you do with it rather than letting it consume your life."
And for those who may not know exactly what to say or do in observance of Veterans Day, this Purple Heart recipient who has reinvented himself and redefined his own life after cheating death in Afghanistan has this insightful advice:
"Honestly, a 'Thank you for your service' can go so far,'" he says. "Someone can be struggling and you don't even realize it. Just reach out and let them know you're thinking of them. A 'thank you' could literally change someone's life."
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