The Commercial Appeal (June 5th 2009)

For Shelton, dreams play out as he imagined

Although he has five No. 1 country singles and has sold a couple million records, it didn't hit Blake Shelton just how far he'd come since he released his eponymous debut eight years ago until he took the stage recently to honor one of his heroes.

Shelton, who performs tonight at Sam's Town Casino, was one of many Nashville stars who appeared in last week's televised special "George Strait: ACM Artist of the Decade All Star Concert," joining Brooks & Dunn, Tim McGraw, Alan Jackson and others in honoring country's biggest hit-maker. Shelton joined with his girlfriend, Miranda Lambert, to sing Strait's "It Ain't Cool To Be Crazy About You."

"It was awkward," says Shelton who is opening for Strait on his summer tour. "I've performed George Strait songs my entire life but I never would have imagined singing one to him."

For Shelton. it was the realization of a dream long forgotten.

"When I was 16, 17 years old, I imagined being up there with all my favorite singers all the time," he says. "The older I got the more reality kind of set in, and you start realizing how far-fetched some of those ideas and dreams are. Now that I am getting to do these things, I sure do appreciate it because I know the odds of being successful in the music industry are way up there. Getting to do things that mean something to you personally are extra along the way."

Shelton grew up in Ada, Okla., a sleepy little town where "you're either somebody who's really into sports . or you hunted and fished or you got in trouble." By his own admission, Shelton was in the last two categories.

"The only redeeming quality about me was that I was easy to get along with and I knew how to sing and play guitar a little bit," he remembers.

At age 7, Shelton's mom took notice of her son's singing around the house and began entering him in talent contests. By the time he graduated from high school, the show-biz bug had taken hold.

"I decided if I was going to do anything with my life noteworthy, it was going to be through music," he recalls. "Two weeks after I graduated high school, I packed up and moved to Nashville."

A decade later, Shelton had a record deal, breaking through in 2001 with his first No. 1 single, "Austin," off his eponymous debut. His warm voice has helped him stake out lot of territory, turning out pure honky-tonk, Jimmy Buffet-style party numbers like "Some Beach," and more pop-oriented material like his 2008 cover of Michael Bublé's "Home." On his latest LP, Startin' Fires , released last August, the singer tried to shake things up again.

"I felt like it was my fifth album, it was time to take a little turn and explore a little bit and push the boundaries of what my audience expects of me," he says.

The gambit paid off with Shelton's fifth No. 1, "She Wouldn't Be Gone." Written by Cory Batten and Jennifer Battan, the song, with its run-on on lyrics and unexpected melodic swoops, was one of several the singer picked to test the his abilities.

"I knew there was something special about that song. The only question was, could I get away with doing it?" he says. "That's one of those songs I'm cussing each night when I get out there to sing it and my face is turning blue, but its got so much energy in it it's a lot of fun to perform."