Kenny Chesney had a very special guest for his show at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles. The country music superstar was joined by Kelsea Ballerini to sing their No. 1 hit, “Half Of My Hometown,” plus his 2011 single, “You and Tequila,” featuring Grace Potter. Chesney also sang “When The Sun Goes Down” and “Drift Away” with tour opener Uncle Kracker, and “All The Pretty Girls” with another opener, Megan Moroney, going into “She Thinks My Tractor’s Sexy.”
“The beauty of music, especially live music, is that every day is different, and every day it will surprise you,” Chesney reflected after the show. “If you’re in the moment of it, you can sing with three really good friends in the same show, and know that will never happen again.”
The show was part of Chesney’s ongoing Sun Goes Down Tour, an unforgettable night for the country music superstar.
“You can tell when you hit the stage when an audience is ready to bring everything they’ve got,” Chesney said. “No Shoes Nation more than showed up at SoFi; they sang hard, were on their feet from the beginning and really leaning into songs that set a positive vibe for living life in the moment.”
Chesney’s current tour is one of his favorites from his 30-plus year career, a testament to his talented band and crew, who he is fortunate enough to share the experience with, night after night.
“One of the things I’m very proud of on the road is that we’ve got a — I’m very thankful for this –is that we’ve got a catalog of music that spans over a lot of years,” Chesney boasted. “We’re able to be in the moment, take songs out of the set or add them into the set. I have this thing called a 911 mic where I can hit a button, and I can do an audible in the middle of the previous song. And say, ‘Hey, we’re gonna skip this next song, and we’re gonna put another song in.’”
“Half of My Hometown,” from Ballerini’s third studio album, Kelsea, is a nod to both Ballerini and Chesney’s shared East Tennessee heritage. Ballerini had already completed the song when she reached out to Chesney to see if he would sing on it with her.
“She just called me one day and she goes, ‘I’m calling you to poke the bear,’ and I went, ‘What are you talking about?’” Chesney recalled on Today’s Country Radio with Kelleigh Bannen. “She says, ‘I’m getting ready to send you a song. I want you to listen to it and think about singing on it.’ And so I said, ‘Yeah, of course, send me the song,’ And I listened to it, and it was hard to listen to because it was so beautiful and it was so much about not only her life, but it was about my life and the same roads we drove down. I knew I wanted to sing on it.”
Chesney is back at radio with “Just To Say We Did,” the second single from his latest BORN album, released in March. The song follows “Take Her Home,” which became his 33rd No. 1 hit.
Chesney is also joined on his Sun Goes Down Tour by Zac Brown Band. Find “Take Her Home” and all of Chesney’s music and upcoming shows at KennyChesney.com.
Photo Credit: Courtesy of EB Media / Ash Summerford