You'd think I'd have been happiest in my life playing music in front of 50,000 people at Gillette Stadium. But let me tell you, it's an odd feeling to feel alone in the spotlight.

Football taught me how hard you had to work to achieve something.

We leaned on family, church, school, friends and sports. That's basically all we had. All those things really shaped my life and shaped me musically. It's why I write the way I do.

I grew up in east Tennessee, and everybody knew everybody's business.

I'm dating a girl who's pretty levelheaded. She's a nurse. She's a real, normal girl. Which is what I need because my life isn't normal.

When Obama talks about raising taxes on the rich, he's looking at me.

I live on a boat two months out of the year, and if I did not have that then I don't know how I'd be able to handle all this.... I am a very intense person on stage. I have to remember why I am there, what I am doing. You can spend all day backstage preparing for the show and lose sight of why you are doing this. Off stage, I am a very simple kind of guy. I live my life in flip-flops.