SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
A lot of us think we might have lucky numbers, maybe a birthday or some address. The country music star Kane Brown saw one number almost everywhere he looks.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "3")
KANE BROWN: (Singing) Three, yeah, that number's always meant so much to me. My mama had me back in '93. I was 3 years old and 3 feet tall when I started playing ball. And the number on my back was always three.
Three's just - it's always been in my life. It just pops up every now and then all over the place. I just got to look around the room.
SIMON: Wasn't Babe Ruth No. 3?
KANE BROWN: He was.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "3")
KANE BROWN: (Singing) Everybody's got their lucky number.
SIMON: Kane Brown's fourth full-length album just came out, "The High Road." He sings about his fears and anxieties, which he offers isn't something that comes easily to him in conversation.
KANE BROWN: I'm not much of a talker, so my life growing up and just being around different people, having to not growing up in the best circumstances. I never let anybody just in.
SIMON: But you - what? - you open up on stage in front of people?
KANE BROWN: Yeah, at my shows. Feels like that's when I get to talk about my life and tell them how I feel in the songs that I sing. And depending on, like, what questions I've gotten, I've known that there's probably more of the same in the audience. So I know to talk about those things.
SIMON: What do some of your fans tell you?
KANE BROWN: I've got a lot of messages from, like, moms or little kids who are biracial and things like that, and you know, say that their kids get picked on or they get picked on and just telling them how I'm just a great role model for them. I've had other people, like, hear my song "Haunted," that talks about depression, and they just say how relatable that song is.
(SOUNDBITE OF KANE BROWN SONG, "HAUNTED")
KANE BROWN: I had a guy send me a video the other day, and he was just saying how that song is so special and so powerful. I messaged back to him and said, you know, I'm here for you. I know how dark it is, and you are more than welcome to reach out to me anytime if you ever need somebody to talk to. If I know that I can, you know, save somebody's life, then I'll do everything I can to do it.
SIMON: That's extraordinary, Mr. Brown. You're there for us, aren't you?
KANE BROWN: Yeah. I wish I had people there for me whenever I was coming up, and, you know, I felt like now God's put me here to be there for other people.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "HAUNTED")
KANE BROWN: (Singing) Part of me is feeling like a ghost, oh, whoa. 'Cause I'm haunted by the voice in my head. I'm haunted by the taste of that lead. I wanted too many times to jump off of the edge, thinking I was better off dead. I'm haunted only every other night. I'm haunted, and I wish I knew why, I wanted too many times to be gone by the morning. If I'm honest, yeah, I'm haunted.
SIMON: I gather you had tough times in your family when you were young.
KANE BROWN: Yeah. They weren't the easiest.
SIMON: You were sometimes homeless.
KANE BROWN: Yeah, I moved around, lived with some friends, moved to different schools. Yeah, basically, just anybody that would take me in. I'd stay there.
SIMON: That's got to be tough for you, a young man.
KANE BROWN: It was tough. I don't know. I kind of looked more of it as fun than anything 'cause I was a nice kid, so I had a lot of good people around me, and I always stayed out of trouble, so it wasn't, I guess, hard for anybody to take me in.
SIMON: And how'd you find music?
KANE BROWN: Music was just always my escape. Yeah, it was always with me, no matter - wherever I went.
SIMON: You won a talent show in high school?
KANE BROWN: Yeah, sang Chris Young's "Gettin' You Home." And yeah, I just remember kids coming up to me afterwards. And that's when I was like, maybe I could do this for a career. I remember the popular girl in school ended up coming up and she was just crying and was like, I didn't know you could sing like that. And I mean, it kind of got weird in that moment.
SIMON: (Laughter).
KANE BROWN: It was really cool.
(SOUNDBITE OF KANE BROWN AND KATELYN BROWN SONG, "DO US APART")
SIMON: Can I get you to talk about the duets you do with your wife, Katelyn Brown?
KANE BROWN: Yeah, they're just, you know, she was an artist before we met, and she kind of quit her career, basically, to move to Nashville with me and follow me around and just support me. And this is me giving her beautiful voice somewhere to shine her light as well. And I'm grateful to have her on these songs and on the stage.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "DO US APART")
KATELYN BROWN: (Singing) And one day, when the mountains and the valleys align, I'll still be yours. You'll still be mine. One thing is true - I'll be loving you.
KANE BROWN AND KATELYN BROWN: (Singing) A love like this'll live on, I know, even on the day that he calls me home. No, I won't be far. Even death won't do us apart.
SIMON: What's it like to sing together?
KANE BROWN: It's awesome. So much easier than singing with another girl. I'll tell you that. 'Cause for me, you know, I have a couple of other features with girls, and it was just really awkward cause singing love songs, and, I mean, it goes for every other artist, like, they're not - they don't really have a feeling for each other more than likely. And mine just makes sense 'cause she's my wife.
SIMON: (SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "DO US APART")
KATELYN BROWN: (Singing) ...Burning out.
KANE BROWN: (Singing) We'll be standing tall when it all burns down.
KATELYN BROWN: (Singing) One thing is true...
KANE BROWN AND KATELYN BROWN: (Singing) ...I'll be loving you.
SIMON: I want to talk a little bit more about your family life, as we hear it in this album. Let's listen to a little bit of "Backseat Driver."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BACKSEAT DRIVER")
KANE BROWN: (Singing) She said, Daddy, look, there's a plane in the sky. Are we there yet? Did you just see that dog run by?
SIMON: What's it like to be on the road with a young family?
KANE BROWN: With my kids, we always said they were COVID babies. So they didn't really get out of the house much at first, and then now they get to travel. They're about to go to the West Coast for the first time and get to explore and do some things. When I was a kid, I never went further than Florida.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BACKSEAT DRIVER")
KANE BROWN: (Singing) My little dangling feet, pretty in pink, backseat driver.
It's just cool to see their face light up whenever they get on the bus. Like the other day when I told my oldest that's 5, I said, we're going to Georgia. And she was like, what? We're going to Georgia? So it's just really cute just to hear them get excited about that stuff.
SIMON: They may not remember each and every place, but they'll remember the closeness they feel with you and your wife.
KANE BROWN: Yeah, that's what we're trying to do is just give them some memories.
SIMON: Kane Brown - his newest album is "The High Road." Thank you so much for being with us.
KANE BROWN: Yeah, thank you for having me.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BACKSEAT DRIVER")
KANE BROWN: (Singing) ...Answer back, she said, Daddy, can you please... Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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