Cox News Service (June 12th 2006)

Shelton laid back, but far from lazy

Blake Shelton claims to be laid-back, a simple man.

But don’t let those claims lead you to believe Shelton’s been lazily moseying around the country singing songs.

No one becomes a country music star without some serious hustle.

Shelton will play Pinnacle Homes Country Jam at 5 p.m. on Saturday, June 24.

The Oklahoman’s first stage performance was at age 8 when his mother signed him up for a talent show at a beauty contest.

"I was totally embarrassed and humiliated and I didn’t want any of my friends to know about it," Shelton told Country Weekly for its "Star Stats." "I told my mom I didn’t want to sing anymore because it’s too embarrassing."

He got over it, though, and as a teen sang in a show honoring Mea Boren Axton, co-writer of "Heartbreak Hotel," according to Country Weekly. She told Shelton to move to Nashville.

He did at age 17. Eight years later, in July 2001, his self-titled first album came out.

Shelton also scored his first No. 1 hit that month with "Austin." It stayed on the top of the country music charts for five weeks.

In 2003, Shelton came out with "The Dreamer" and in 2004, "Barn & Grill" with the hit single "Some Beach."

Shelton expected his fourth album to be out this fall, he told the Myrtle Beach Sun News last month.

Along with saying he’s a "Bud Light guy," Shelton gave his vision for "Barn & Grill."

"I just wanted to make an album - not necessarily full of drinking songs - but that are cool to listen to when you’re drinking beer. I call it a 'jukebox album,’ an album that sounds at home in any bar in the country," Shelton said in the interview. "I think that’s what we were able to do. It was the first time I ever set out to do a project and had a vision in my mind and it came out exactly how I wanted it to be. Luckily it’s turned out to be our most successful album so far."

Shelton said his "career highlight to date is 'my first album, when it went gold,’" in an interview with Janis Fontaine with Cox News Service.

But that’s not his focus.

"There’s are always other things to strive for. I want to go to the next level, and the next level after that ... I try not to look back too much," Shelton told Fontaine. "I want to save that for one of these days when I’m old, and no one remembers me. That’s when I want to stop and get excited about the past. I’ll be the old man that brags about everything he’s done one of these days."