Keith Urban does not ride his bus, or use a driver, to get to his shows. Instead, Urban reveals he almost always drives himself to his own gigs, for one important reason: to help him quiet his mind.
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"I drive," Urban reveals on Country Countdown USA, when asked what he does to unwind. "I drove to the gig the other night, and someone asked, 'How come you drive yourself?' I said I always drive myself. Somebody driving me is like somebody playing my guitar. I'd rather be doing it."
Urban needs an international license to drive to some of his shows on his current tour. Urban just wrapped up some shows in Australia, and will next head to Canada. Not surprisingly, at least for Urban, the father of two tailors each show to his audience, especially on his international dates.
"We made a couple of song tweaks for Australia," Urban says. "Songs that were released here that weren't in the US, and some local covers. I'll do the same thing in Canada. I usually think of them as I'm driving to the gig."
Keith Urban On His High And Alive World Tour
Urban loves touring more than any other part of his career. But he also admits he struggles when on the road, especially when it come to knowing which songs to play, which ones not to play, and the order his songs should go in.
"It's a lot of trial and error with set lists for me," Urban acknowledges. "I agonize over setlists. It's like a Rubik's Cube. I spend months and months over setlists, tweaking, coming back to it every couple of days, looking at it. I put a playlist together and Iisten to the songs back-to-back-to-back, and just feel the flow from one song into the next - energy-wise, thematically, the key, tempo, everything."
"Does this feel like it should flow out of that?" he adds. "Is the audience gonna be exhausted right about here? This would be a good time for a ballad. This would be a good time to strip it down to an acoustic song and then BOOM right back out of the gate again. Trying to imagine what the live experience is gonna be and put a setlist together for it."
Urban also started his High and Alive World Tour with a few new bandmates, after unexpectedly replacing some of his former members earlier this year.
