When the Paisleys sit down to eat Thanksgiving dinner this week, Brad Paisley will certainly have plenty of reasons for gratitude — several, in fact, that are specifically related to the month of November.
He released a new album, Hits Alive, Nov. 2, and the following week, he and Carrie Underwood did a bang-up job as hosts of the Country Music Association Awards, where he finally walked off with the CMA’s top prize, Entertainer of the Year. Sunday, he picked up an American Music Award, and now he’s also at No. 1 on two different country singles charts. His business cards must be flying off the shelf.
Both Billboard and Country Aircheck have him listed at the top with “Anything Like Me,” a song from Hits Alive that reflects on his own youth and the future of his two boys, Huck and Jasper. Brad actually wrote and recorded “Anything” before Jasper’s arrival, but Huck’s inspiration — and Brad’s hopes and dreams for his son — were enough to connect the song to the audience at large.
“When you go and hear those words and think about, you know, ‘probably climb a tree too tall, ride his bike too fast,’ it’s things that we did,” Brad reflects. “I mean, ‘end up every summer wearing somethin’ in a cast, probably throw a ball and break some glass’ — who hasn’t done that? And all those things are just things that I did and my co-writers did. It’s pretty true to life.”
In the middle of the storyline, Brad’s harboring a bit of that classic, frowned-upon parental position: “Do as I say, not as I do.”
“All those things that I’m talking about that he does like ‘probably stay out too late, drive his car too fast,’ I kind of hope he does,” Brad admits. “Same with the ‘throw a ball,’ and you know, all of these are things that I’m equal parts a little bit scared of and hopeful that he actually also does them.”
Brad’s already come up with a follow-up. Hot on the heels of his CMA performance of a brand new song, he released “This Is Country Music” to radio stations on Thursday.
Courtesy of GACtv.com
