Keith Urban‘s The Speed of Now Part 1 was released in 2020, as the world was largely shut down due to the pandemic. Urban is now back on the road, on his The Speed of Now World Tour, while he also works on a new album, one he hints was largely inspired by his current hometown of Nashville.

“‘Wild Hearts‘ is the first single, ‘Brown Eyes Baby‘ is the second single,” Urban shared with Everything Nash and other outlets, during a recent virtual media event. “There’s somewhat of a thematic creative context that I started to find songs all coming towards what would be this next project. Nashville is an incredibly creative community, and I’ve had the opportunity to travel everywhere and write with all kinds of people, and work with different people all over, really all over the world.

“And I’ve been so heartened to remember how much insane talent is here in Nashville: writers, engineers, players, producers, etc.,” he continues. “So there was a concerted effort on my part to look and find these songs that all came together with all of that criteria. That’s somewhat of the common thread that’s coming in this next album.”

Urban plans to do some more writing while on his The Speed of Now World Tour, thanks to the addition of Tyler Hubbard. Hubbard, begins his run with Urban on September 3, an invitation that the New Zealand native offered in part so the two could write together.

“First of all, I’ve always loved [Tyler’s] voice,” Urban tells Apple Music Country’s Today’s Country Radio with Kelleigh Bannen. “We got to write together a few months ago for the first time, and we wrote a song that he ended up recording that I’m very excited about. And it was really great being in a writing room with him. I was curious about his process and his way of approaching things. And I was really impressed with his compositional skills as a writer. He’s really, really good.”

“Brown Eyes Baby” was written by Morgan Wallen, Rodney Clawson, Will Bundy and Josh Thompson, although Urban had no idea who wrote it until after he decided to record it.

“I found that Morgan was a writer on it maybe the day after or thereabouts,” Urban recalls. “He didn’t sing the demo. I think Josh Thompson, who’s one of the other four writers on the song, sang the demo. But it also made sense. It’s a great song, and Morgan’s a great songwriter. I was just thrilled that he didn’t want to cut it.”

All of Urban’s music and tour dates can be found at KeithUrban.com.