Keith Urban has won 13 CMA Awards, 15 ACM Awards and four Grammy Awards, but he doesn’t have most of them on display at his home. Instead, the 52-year-old keeps at least some them in a surprising place, far away from where he usually resides.
“My mom has a few of them,” Keith revealed to ET Canada. ” “I wouldn’t be here without my mom driving me around all the gigs, and all of that back in the day. She was fantastic.”
Keith could add several more trophies to his collection this year. The New Zealand-born star is nominated for one ACM Award and three CMA Awards, including for Entertainer of the Year. The nominations for the CMA Awards were just announced, with Keith receiving the good news from several of his friends.
“I heard about it by waking up to about 26 texts from everybody,” Keith recounted. “It’s a strange feeling when you turn your phone on and you have a flurry of texts. You’re like this is either really bad news or really good news!”
Keith will release his innovative The Speed of Now Part 1 album on September 18. He has already teased a few songs from the record, including “Polaroid,” “Tumbleweed” and “Superman” — all tracks that hint Keith is masterfully blurring the genre lines even more with his new set of tunes.
“[I’m] more a curiosity seeker, and just following my instincts of curiosity, without holding myself back,” Keith explained. “I’ve never thought even in terms of pushing boundaries. I think it’s more about not stopping myself from going there, which is a different approach to everything.”
Keith recorded most of The Speed of Now Part 1 while forced home because of COVID-19, an initial setback that became a blessing in disguise.
“I came out knowing more about record-making, which I do every time I make records,” Keith said. “But spending as much time as I did in the studio of my house was really a Godsend, having a studio at the house, which made finishing the record possible. And the other thing I realized through this period, was getting back to being creative with limited resources.
“Even in the opening track, ‘Out the Cage,’ which I did with BRELAND, and two other guys from Nashville, there were so many things I wanted to do on this record, recording-wise,” he added. “I wanted this 50-person choir in the breakdown section of the song. I wanted an orchestra here, and they’re like, ‘Well, that’s not happening, so what else are we going to do?'”
It was BRELAND who had the idea to stack his own vocals to make the choir-like sound that Keith was going for, earning the respect of Keith in the process.
“He’s got a great handle on all of it,” Keith boasted. “He is a really talented, very woke, smart and deeply gifted individual and equally sweet human being.”
Keith will host the 2020 ACM Awards, which will air live from Nashville on Wednesday, September 16, at 8:00 PM ET on CBS.
