Press Release Du Jour

Kenny Chesney’s No Shoes Radio Sets Sail July 26
Boston’s Gillette Stadium Show Marks Launch of XM Kenny Station

Foxboro, MA: Never mind that tickets for Kenny Chesney’s Poets & Pirates Tour sold out in 15 minutes back in December. Forget about the fact that a chunk of his critically acclaimed live, Live Those Songs Again was recorded at Gillette Stadium, home of the New England Patriots. Don’t even bother considering that this is the fourth straight year the 4-straight Academy of Country Music and 3-time and current Country Music Association Entertainer of the Year has packed the home of the New England Patriots to the bursting for an all day celebration of good times, good friends and good music.

Just when it didn’t seem there was anything the full-tilt performer could add to the intensity, Chesney and his friends at XM Radio will launch the almost all-Kenny No Shoes Radio on July 26 with a live 4 hour kick-off from the ultimate tail-gate experience: the parking lot of Gillette Stadium. Broadcasting from a stage being set up as half broadcast booth/half acoustic performance space, look for Jon Anthony to create the day’s largest boom box for the fans who are coming to get their Kenny on.

“The whole idea behind the station,” Chesney says, “is to take that energy in the parking lot and keep it going. You buzz around in a golf cart before the show, and it sounds like some kind of carnival with all this different music, all these different songs… and No Shoes isn’t just about a buncha my stuff people know, and stuff they may not know as well, but it’s about rare live performances, drop ins and acoustic surprises from my friends and just keeping that vibe alive long after the show has left town.”

In the spirit of spontaneous music and expanding the musical reality of Chesney’s world, not only will the headline be dropping by the stage during the four hour kick-off, but LeAnn Rimes will also drop-in– and there are any number of you-never-know-who-might-show-ups in the wind. As if that sense of musical camaraderie isn’t enough, the good folks at XM are going to be giving away free XM radios – while supplies last – to anyone who signs up for a three month plan.

“We’ve got chunks of our Key West show going up this weekend,” says the man who’s had three multiple week #1s – “Never Wanted Nothing More,” “Don’t Blink” and “Better As A Memory” --from his platinum Just Who I Am: Poets & Pirates. “Anyone who’s ever wanted to go to a Keg in the Closet show, but couldn’t get there – or get in if they could – they can experience what that’s like. It’s going to be crazy having some of this music, played in some of these settings going out to the world, but in a way, it’s a great chance to bring people all the way into our world.”

I need to read it again... I was sure there would be a line included that went something like.. "Seven year XM veteran Producer J., the senior member of the XM Nashville programming team, will be boarding a Southwest Airlines jet headed for the north east where the Central IL native will be responsible for producing the high-energy fan-packed four hour live broadcast originating from the west side of Gillette stadium and ringing out border to border and coast to coast across North America on the newly created XM channel 18."