Kenny Chesney on Getting His Restlessness From His Mom and Dad: “They Had an Intense Work Ethic”

While chatting to Apple Music's Kelleigh Bannen about the creation of his new album, Silver Sands Marina, Kenny Chesney touches on how he struggles to enjoy long breaks from creating, explaining that he gets his restlessness from his mother and father.

Chesney reflects on how he finds it difficult to step away from the writing room, the studio or touring for lengthy periods, “The moment that I have about four weeks to myself, I think, ‘Oh, this is great.’ And then I wake up one day and I start to get antsy and I start to feel like I’m missing something or I should be doing something”.

He meditates on where this constant creative impulse stems from, “And that comes from a place of years of it not happening for me. And the drive that I have, but the fear of failure...And look, we’ve been fairly successful over the years, but still, before I moved to town or whatever it was, that my dad was a coach, my mom was a hairdresser, so they had an intense work ethic and I got that from them”.

Chesney candidly concludes, “So my point is that when I’m still, I love it, but I start to freak out just a little bit. And I think that’s that creative soul inside of me, hits me on the shoulder. Maybe it won’t one day, but I’m thankful, so thankful, that it still does”.

What's evident throughout Chesney's consistent output over the past few decades, though, is there's definitely no compulsion to produce new projects solely to satisfy this creative urge. Rather, it seems the ‘No Shoes, No Shirt, No Problems’ hitmaker is constantly writing and recording, but he has one of the best filters in modern country music when it comes to deciding which songs to actually release.

This discernment is what helps make Silver Sands Marina such a compelling listen, with Chesney being open in interviews around the release about how determined he was to record songs that felt completely different to what he's done previously.

You hear this most strikingly on left-field gems like the subtly subversive ‘Shot a Car Into Space’, the playful and unashamedly innocent ‘Goldfish’, and the innovative ‘Sad Casino’.

This inherent need to keep moving also helps to fuel the Knoxville native's ongoing status as one of the strongest touring acts in today's country landscape. Even when pitted against some of the younger stars in Nashville, Chesney is able to sell out venues that many modern-day chart-toppers can't yet headline. Next year, Chesney embarks on his Original Vibe Room Stadium Tour with Eric Church.

It's heartwarming to hear Chesney speak about his parents’ influence on him in this way, with the ‘I Go Back’ crooner revealing that his mother's role as a hairdresser was what initially drew him to ‘Talkin’ Dirt’, one of the stand-outs on Silver Sands Marina.

Chesney fondly outlines, “‘Talkin’ Dirt’ is a song about something that we just can’t help but love, and that is small town gossip. I know it’s not very Christian, but we all love it. I’ve lived on an island for a lot of my adult life, and I’ve lived in a small town, and everybody knows everybody’s business on both. But my mom worked at a beauty shop, my cousins worked there, my Aunt Missy worked there”.

He adds, “A lot of women in my family worked in that same place. So, when I was a kid or even high school or even in college, when I would come home for college, I would go in and it was like one stop shopping. I could go in and see everybody. And if you wanted to know anything about anybody, you just sat there for about 30 minutes”.

Chesney has paid homage to his mother and father's support throughout his storied career, and deciding to include this touching ode to the memory of being in his mother's shop helps to give Silver Sands Marina an extra layer of intimacy and personality. It's a vibrant, evocative record, and judging by Chesney's admissions about getting restless, we're hoping it's not long before he decides to return to the studio and record a few more tracks - potentially as part of a deluxe project.

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