Keith Urban Interviewed On Living And Learning With Reba McEntire

 Spotify’s “Living & Learning with Reba McEntire” is currently airing its second season where country music icon and host Reba McEntire is letting fans join her journey to discuss and grow with some of her famous friends.  

 

 This week’s episode features an in-depth conversation with musician, singer, and songwriter Keith Urban. The endlessly charming Urban, who is married to actress Nicole Kidman, kicks back with Reba for a down-to-earth chat about music, marriage, family, purpose, and a touching peek into the formative childhood memories that set Keith and Reba on their creative paths as performers. 

 

 You can listen to the series HERE.

  

Below are some key moments from the episode:

 

1:57 - 3:17 // Keith Urban on returning back to work after the height of the pandemic and asks Reba about her pandemic viewing habits:

Reba McEntire: “Were you itching to get back out there to perform or were you kind of OK with it all?”

Keith Urban: “At bit of both. We were finishing up our album. The biggest panic for me was that I hadn’t finished my record and being a collaborative person with co-producers, musicians engineers. I was like oh so I can’t do that with anybody, for how long. I think like a lot of people here was my pandemic plan: just gonna put on my sweatpants, get some popcorn, sit on a the couch with the family and watch Netflix until this all blows over. That was my plan.”

Reba McEntire: “I did get to watch a lot of Netflix. I loved it all.”

Keith Urban: “What did you watch, besides Tiger King. That was mandatory viewing.”

Reba McEntire: “I have not watched Tiger King I did watch Nicole’s shows for sure, Nine Perfect Strangers, I had no idea where that was going at all and at the end, wow… Rex and I, we love to watch television..”

 

6:00 - 7:06 // Keith on how ‘Wild Hearts’ song came about and reveals how he saw Johnny Cash at five years old, to Reba’s surprise:

Reba McEntire: “Tell me about Wild Hearts!”

Keith Urban: “I passed on the song [at first]..so I called the writers and asked if I could rewrite the verses to make them personal to me and luckily they agreed so I wrote the first and second verse. And the first verse I remember sitting there at the kitchen table one morning kids were gone Nic [Nicole Kidman] was gone. I drank this really strong coffee. I was like ‘alright, where does my journey begin and the very first thought I had was my mom and dad taking my brother and I to see Johnny Cash when I was five years old. That very much felt like the first part of it. So I wrote down ‘saw the man in black, spotlight in the air, heard a thousand screams, saw my daddy stare’ and then we were off and running.”

Reba McEntire: “I love that. So five years old you saw Johnny Cash?”
Keith Urban: “Yeah.”

Reba McEntire: “Wow.”

Keith Urban: “That’ll stay with you.”

Reba McEntire: “I don’t think that I ever saw Johnny Cash in concert!”

 

11:17 - 12:03 // Keith Urban shares how him and wife Nicole Kidman juggle their careers, family life and traveling between the US and Australia:

Reba McEntire: “How in the world have you juggled a career and a marriage, living in Australia/United States back and forth. You guys being so popular and busy. How do y’all do it?”

Keith Urban: “We live in Nashville, that’s been home for me for 30 years now. I’ve lived in America longer than I’ve lived in Australia. I was 23 when I moved to Nashville so it’s crazy. We have a place in Australia but we don't live there. We go down to visit Nic’s mom and my mom both live there, Nic’s sister, brother in law all their kids and my brother and his kids so we got a lot of family down there but it’s a long way. You’ve done that flight before?”

Reba McEntire: “Yeah I have.”

Keith Urban: “You can meet someone and break up on that flight, Reba.”

 

12:37- 13:24 // Keith Urban reveals that one of his biggest achievements has been marrying Nicole Kidman as the right person and his sobriety:

Reba McEntire: “What’s been your biggest achievement, to you?” 

Keith Urban: “There’s a lot of things. Marrying the right person, massive. Marrying for the right reasons, getting sober 15 years ago, a big turning point in my life. I never had specific goals I just wanted to, when I was a kid I just wanted to live in Nashville, wanted to write songs make some records and hope the radio plays them, some people come see us play our own music instead of covers that I’m playing. That was it that was the goal.”

 

24:53- 25:44 // Keith Urban tells Reba that his career has led him to join her podcast and shares how Reba has been a part of his life through all this time:

Keith Urban: “For me, that’s the single most important question. Why do I play music? Because it’s just organic it’s like I said I'd be playing in the street corner somewhere. That's why I do it, I don’t do it for where it’s taking me now. I just had this intense love and passion and drive to keep doing it and try to get better at it. And the end result was doing a podcast with you, Reba. Which is crazy!”

Reba: McEntire: “Aww! Listen at you.”

Keith Urban: “It’s true. But you gotta understand I grew up in Australia and I’m going to the CD store and there's a Reba McEntire CD and I’m like buying your CD’s and now I’m on a freaking podcast with you, it's crazy.”

Reba McEntire: “I love it. It’s almost like our music is the conduit to help people..”

 

Reba and Keith end the podcast with a fun game of “Urban Legends” where the duo come up with their own sets of two truths and a lie.

 

About “Living & Learning With Reba McEntire” 

Hosted by the beloved country music icon, Living & Learning with Reba McEntire is inspired and informed by the way Reba approaches life: with an insatiable curiosity, dedication to expanding her knowledge, and reliance on her own lived experience. Each week, Reba will continue to tackle numerous topics through informative and intriguing conversations with a variety of celebrity guests. New episodes will drop every Monday, free only on Spotify.