Categories
Featured

Kenny Chesney’s ‘Born’: All 15 Tracks Ranked

On Kenny Chesney‘s 20th studio album Born, out today (March 22) via Blue Chair Records/Warner Music Nashville, he continues his reputation for recording songs that both elevate the spirit and cut to the bone.

Landing nearly four years after his 2020 album Here and Now, Chesney’s latest revels in both taking risks and taking in every moment life gives you. Chesney included more songs than ever on his new project, clocking in at 15 tracks, each one mining universal truths and detailing yearnings for love, freedom and connection.

He works once again with his longtime producer Buddy Cannon, crafting an album that is a patchwork of songs, musical commemorations of a myriad of life moments, drawing on spontaneous road trips and dive-bars filled with the scent of ocean breezes, as well as high-octane instances of embracing wide-open independence, and tempered by more contemplative spaces accepting how time refines lives, both healing hurts and spilling heartbreaks, etching memories firmly into consciousness. Some songs, such as “Take Her Home,” touch on lasting love, while “Guilty Pleasure” centers on passion in the moment. A feeling of gratitude for the full spectrum of life courses through the album.

“There was no theme we’re singing about that holds it together,” the eight-time entertainer of the year winner said in a statement regarding the album. “But if you listen to all 15 songs, you’ll get the high energy fun, chasing adventures, don’t let people get you down piece and you’ll get the more reflective thinking about someone who’s died, the person you know you shouldn’t call emotions that have always been in the music, too.”

Perhaps a line in one of the album’s tracks, “Few Good Stories,” sums it up best: “When it’s all said and done, I’ll know I lived it well If I ain’t got nothing but a few good stories to tell.”

Here’s a look at Billboard‘s ranking of the album’s 15 tracks: