Kenny Chesney didn’t think his life was a story. Then his memoir changed everything

It’s rare for an artist almost four decades into a career to have firsts. Last year, Kenny Chesney had three: first solo and first country artist to headline the Sphere in Las Vegas, induction into the Country Music Hall of Fame and his first New York Times Best Seller, “Heart Life Music.”

Called “a love letter to the journey,” the book took readers on a ride through the places, faces and events that shaped a populist American music career for the East Tennessean. Chesney has built a massive fan base called “No Shoes Nation” on high-energy shows and songs that celebrate the notion of working hard, playing harder and always reaching for the positive in whatever’s happening.

With a second Sphere residency kicking off this month, Chesney sat down with his memoir co-author Holly Gleason to talk about writing the book, his life and what’s ahead.

We are here to have an author-on-author conversation about the process, what you learned about your life…

Fantastic!

The thing about this book: You didn’t want to do it when we started.

No, I didn’t. Because I didn’t know if there was a story there. We have been working really hard for a really long time, and I’ve been so busy creating; if I’m not creating, I’m putting out what I created.

There’s always a good reason to not be still enough to write a book. Over time, you wore me down, to make me pause, and make reflect. It is a very unique story. I think if you’re young and you have a dream, no matter if it’s music or whatever, you can take something from this.

And I’m glad we did this. You, Mauro [DiPreta, executive editor at William Morrow], everybody involved were, “You wanna write this book?” I thought, “Yeah, this sounds great.”

Then there’s writing it, and then there’s putting it out. I truly enjoyed the process of both.

When we were starting the process, you realized the way you chased your dream and developed your talent into what became a substantial career in music isn’t done anymore.

Anything worth achieving in chasing your dream, if you get it all at once, it’s not the same. If you’re young, you want it all at once; it’s human nature. But there’s something to getting better at what you do, being ready. I’m glad now I didn’t get it all at once. I was able to learn, to grow into what I wanted.

It will shock people what Lower Broadway was.

It was a piece of old Nashville that’s slowly disintegrated. It was a real historical lesson in our genre and our town; the belly of how our music was created, and how magical that time was. Now the soul of what I saw is gone.

Tell me about the Turf Club.

When I moved to Nashville, there was no place to [sit and] play. I found out I could go down to Lower Broadway, and play in all these places — if you had the …

Moxie? Courage?

Yeah, if you had the courage to go down there. It was very unique, a lot of characters. There were a lot of bars that were there when Waylon [Jennings] and Willie [Nelson] and Kris [Kristofferson], all these people were coming up… I got to see that through the Turf Club.

It was the first time I really learned how to talk to an audience, read a room as an entertainer.

You were going to be a baseball player.

When I played high school football, I was this size: 140 pounds soaking wet. I played wide receiver, a average athlete. For me to be on the field at any level, I had to work.

My father was a coach, and he instilled: You may not be the most talented, but be someone they can count on. Be accountable. That’s where I first learned no matter what you do, there are things you can have that don’t take any talent at all. Be coachable, show up, have discipline. Work ethic? You can’t replace that.

I’ve taken everything I’ve learned playing team sports, setting a specific standard for yourself and having everybody buy into that standard, great things can happen.

If you don’t have great people, you’re swimming upstream. That’s in music, sports, corporate America. What we do out there now — rolling down the road — is a team sport that’s confused with music.

You realize no sports. East Tennessee State University has an actual course in bluegrass. You took all that focus and drive and transferred it. Is that fair?

I was at East Tennessee State University, kinda rudderless. I didn’t really know what I wanted to do, but I knew I had this thread of music in my life since I was a child. I started playing music. I learned to play guitar; I was playing in a few places. Then I joined the ETSU Bluegrass Band …

That’s how I met Alison Krauss and a lot of guys in her band Union Station: Barry Bales, Adam Steffey, Tim Stafford. Those guys were part of the ETSU Bluegrass Band when I joined. That’s where I first learned to play music with a group.

My father told me, “To get better at sports, play with people who are older — and better — than you. That’s how you get better than the people your age.”

That’s exactly what happened at East Tennessee State. I was playing with virtuoso musicians who were much better than I’d ever be. I got better pretty quickly.

The other gift you got from the bluegrass band was Russia.

Take a bunch of kids who’ve never been out of East Tennessee. Then they tell you in college, you’re gonna go to Moscow to a music festival. We didn’t know what that meant. Oh, we gotta get a passport; how do we do that? We were really that simple. We went over as a group and didn’t speak anybody’s language. We knew how to say goodbye, which is das vedanya, yes and no.

Once we got there, there was a group from Russia, from Italy, several different countries. We were staying in the same spot; we had translators. But once we started playing music, we realized, “We can go over to this group, and follow along; learn from them and they can learn from us.”

Next thing, we’re communicating. We grew up very differently… We had much different beliefs, didn’t speak each other’s language, but were playing the same notes on the instruments. That’s when we all bonded, and the trip became something different.

That’s the first time I realized how powerful music can be.

Universality kept coming up when we were working on [“Heart Life Music”]: that universality in the islands, too. When you came to Nashville, what was universality part of it?

I was just chasing something. I knew I loved creating and songs. I had no idea I’d get to a place in my life where I’d know how universal it all was.

You go to the Virgin Islands and meet a lot of people who had different political beliefs, religious beliefs, who grew up very differently than I did in East Tennessee. They were great people; they loved love. They were full of positive energy, chasing the sun like I was, having different experiences and adventure.

I never knew my music would take me to those places, to see how universal it all can be. One of our primal needs as human beings is to feel that love and positive energy, to be loved. That’s why people continue to write songs about it.

What was the hardest thing about the book? And you’re not allowed to say “the editing.”

Look, the editing was the tough part, because there’s a lot that’s not in the book. I don’t know. That’s a good question. What was the toughest part for you?

Making sure you told the whole story. Some go way back.

They tell you in therapy: The more you tell the story, the more you remember it. I was afraid I was going to forget something. We kept talking, but then you’d remember this one thing, and it would take you down a completely different path.

A lot songs you wrote — “I Go Back,” “Beer in Mexico,” even the island records — people felt how much life was really in them.

All those songs were very autobiographical. That’s where the best songs come from.

We’ve all sat in rooms where we’ve had a writing appointment; someone’s gonna bring an idea. You write around that idea, make it sound really good with a track guy. It’s great, but the best songs come from life — and lived experiences.

One of the book’s big pivots, after a triple platinum greatest hits but nobody knew you, was challenging yourself to make a record that was you. Then dropping “Young.” That song put really rock guitars …

That song was really autobiographical, although I didn’t write it.

It’s disingenuous for me to put out something I haven’t lived. I’ve done it a couple times with songs that were big records. “There Goes My Life” wasn’t me. I was the interpreter; but I knew people that had, so I was able to make it genuine, singing it for them.

My audience can smell something disingenuous pretty quick.

What was more fun writing: Grace Potter and “You & Tequila,” or Sammy Hagar and “Beer in Mexico”?

I can’t answer that question. Grace and I, we’re insane friends. The universe brought us together; I know that. We’re supposed to know each other. The way our voices blend is unique, it’s almost like family. It is like family.

Add Sammy into that mix, all the fun I’ve had with Sammy onstage, offstage, in Cabo at his birthday parties? Me and my road manager David Farmer played his music in the garage when we were in high school, with pool sticks, playing Eddie Van Halen licks, Sammy Hagar licks; singing all this music that shook our soul.

The other side is Willie [Nelson], whom you’ve recorded more duets with than anyone.

I’ve done four or five with Willie, including my Christmas record. When I met Willie Nelson, and Jimmy Buffett, the same thing, they exceeded what I made up in my head. To collaborate with them, especially Willie, because I produced a record on him with Buddy Cannon… If you’d told me, one day I’d be doing that? That’s an insane thing to believe.

But Willie and I really did connect. I just love him.

When “Young” came out, your life changed. Also, the sound of country radio changed, because the guitars came way forward. Is it because your heroes are diverse?

When your life starts to change, when you go into the studio that music is a direct reflection of the music you soaked up growing up.

Obviously, there was country, bluegrass, gospel. But there was also listening to the rock station; I heard Lynyrd Skynyrd, Tom Petty; I heard AC/DC, Van Halen, Sammy Hagar, all this music that moved me. I heard the Eagles.

I didn’t get the genius of Bruce Springsteen and Bob Marley until I got into college, started writing my own songs — and went, “This is amazing.” That opened a whole other door to me.

Take all of that into the studio, a song like “Young” becomes a reflection of all the stuff you soaked up as a kid.

Then it all starts to happen. You play Neyland Stadium in Knoxville. You spent the whole night looking at…

Where I used to sit. I grew up when there was no social media, no ESPN. You had three networks and PBS. We lived 30 minutes outside of Knoxville, but a guy named John Ward on WIVK called the games. The way he painted the picture for those of us who couldn’t get to the game, that was bigger than life.

The first time I walked in with my father to see Tennessee and Notre Dame play, it was bigger than life. We sat with his friend Jim Cogdill, who’s still a family friend, in the same seats every time: Section Double K, Row 1.

Fast forward to 2003. That night in Knoxville, when I played my first stadium show ever, I spent the majority of the night, staring at section Double K, Row 1. I couldn’t believe I was in that stadium with my band and music with a lot of family in the audience.

What made you believe you could export that excitement? You did Pittsburgh, D.C. and Boston next.

It was a leap of faith. We felt a groundswell in New England, so we did it, D.C. and the Steelers’ stadium in Pittsburgh in 2005. Those went really well, so the next year, our whole tour was football stadiums. Last year, we did Sphere in Vegas.

When you build a road for over 30 years, the trick is to take this and have [people] experience it in completely different ways. Irving Azoff asked me if I’d like to play Sphere. We were at Jimmy Buffett’s memorial concert at the Hollywood Bowl, and Irving said, “I think you should be the first country act to play the Sphere.”

I went, “I think you’re right. That’s something I think we’ve been looking for, my audience has been looking for.”

To be in that space, you see your audience experiencing these songs they’ve “lived” in a completely different state of consciousness. It takes their brain to an immersive space.

We go back to Sphere June 19 — and we’re there until July 11.

What did you learn that got you so fired up, you wanted to go back?

Creating it. Finding different neural pathways for your creativity, but also taking your audience and creating different neural pathways for them to experience this music. Give the audience this amazing look, but the music’s the thread of the whole thing.

At Sphere, everybody gets consumed by the music. The visuals make it hit harder.

The first show — a lot of people are [looking up]. You can’t help but do it.

I went with Irving Azoff to see the Eagles. While we were in rehearsals, me and the band, a couple nights before our first show, went to see Dead & Co. It was good for us to be on that side, seeing how it all came together.

It literally changed how we thought about the process. I don’t think our show would’ve been the same had we not seen how it all comes together.

How will it be different?

We’re doing several songs we didn’t do last year, and some we did do are a completely different look. Without giving it all away, it’s different. The energy’s gonna be the same; it’s not a dark ride … at all. It’s an interesting ride, full of positive energy, full of love. It’s colorful and full of light; I didn’t want my Sphere experience to take anybody down. Nobody’s gonna come and get triggered — if you know what I mean. They’re gonna, hopefully, walk out feeling euphoric.

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