NASHVILLE, TN. (Kenny Chesney Fans Website) - Everyone knows he can't get enough of the sporting life, but now
Kenny Chesney gets even more literal: taking his already - and it hasn't hit the first city yet - sold out Somewhere in the Sun Tour to three of America's biggest stadiums. Having just rocked 70,000 at the
Houston Livestock Show & Rodeo - sporting a therapeutic boot rather than his traditional cowboy boots, the reigning Country
Music Association Entertainer of the Year has his sites set on Washington DC's FedExField, Boston's Gillette Stadium and Pittsburgh's
Heinz Field.
"We got a taste of stadiums when I was out doing those two George Strait tours, and it's a whole other different kind of energy," says the singer/songwriter from Luttrell, Tennessee. "And when we went into UT's Neyland Stadium for the 'Back Where I Come From Homecoming Party' two years ago, that feeling of having that many people there for your music is pretty intense. We've been trying to figure out how to do something like this ever since."
Certainly Chesney's Homecoming show at Knoxville's high temple of college football was an event not to be missed. Captured for a CMT concert special - directed by Beth McCarthy, who directs the half time show at the Superbowl - it showed the biggest, broadest bold spectrum that Chesney's music can accommodate. And for the three shows that are part of this year's Somewhere In The Sun Tour, you can count on Chesney & Co. to kick their "game day" game up several notches.
"We learned a lot at Neyland…," admits the man who's the reigning American Music Awards fan-voted Favorite Artist, over Usher, Outkast, Evanescence and Norah Jones. "And this year's stage is a whole other deal to begin with. We all love playing to where we can really have some fun and try stuff out. Plus, my fans are always up for whatever we can throw at 'em… so they better get ready!"
The first show hits DC on Saturday June 4 at FedExField, where the Washington Redskins take no prisoners. Then in July, it's Saturday July 23 and onto Foxboro, Massachusetts' Gillette Stadium, where current the Super Bowl Champion New England Patriots kick butt, on Saturday July 23. Winding up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on July 30 at Heinz Field, where the Steelers get it done.
"We're always trying to grow this thing, to try different stuff," says the always amenable man who just picked up 5 CMT Music Awards nominations, including Video, Male and Hottest. "The fans keep telling their friends and then they tell someone else, and everybody comes back, cooks out, help us throw a pretty cool party in their hometown. This year, in these markets that have always been ready to have a super-good-time with us. We just supersized the party."
With his no-single, no-tour, now platinum Be As You Are: Songs From An Old Blue Chair heading back into #1 on Billboard's Country Albums chart, "Anything But Mine," from the nearly quadruple platinum CMA Album of the Year When The Sun Goes Down heading to the Top 5 on the Country Singles chart, the Kenny Express shows no signs of slowing down. Having played to 1.2 million fans last year - second only to Prince's Musicology for tickets sold - Kenny Chesney is ready to get out there… and have some fun.
As Somewhere in the Sun - with special guest Gretchen Wilson and Uncle Kracker - gears up to kick-off March 23-24 in Green Bay, following a two week postponement due to an ankle injury, the summer is just getting started. With the line-up for the Stadium show just coming together - featuring perhaps a cast of tour mates past or present - it promises to be the biggest show in country music.
