‘Life Changes,’ reflects the real life world of this hit-making country singer

In retrospect, Thomas Rhett can’t fathom why it took so long to name his 2017 album “Life Changes.”

As what would become his third full-length recording was taking shape, the country music hit maker and his wife Lauren were in the midst of a difficult and extended adoption process of a child from Uganda. Then Lauren learned she was pregnant.

If the prospect of adding two children to a household, not to mention a performance career that had Rhett on tour while his wife was in Africa didn’t constitute life changes, what possibly could?

“Before we even wrote ‘Life Changes,’ I wanted to call the album ‘Sixteen’ (after the song that eventually became the record’s fifth and current single),” remarked Rhett, who makes his Rupp Arena debut with a headlining concert on Thursday.

“Then about a week before we were trying to finish up the album, I was out at my farm with (Danville native) Ashley Gorley and Jesse Frasure, two of my great writer friends and producers. I was just talking about what was happening in my life.

“At that point, my wife was in Uganda trying to finish up the adoption process and I was playing shows. I remember one time I flew from Arizona all the way to Uganda for five days and then flew back over to Nashville. This whole time, my wife was pregnant in Africa. Life could not have been any more chaotic. Then we wrote ‘Life Changes’ and it just slapped me in the face. It was like, ‘This is the album title, the tour name. This describes everything that was happening in my life. This was what I want the album to be about.’”

This year, with Rhett’s world somewhat more settled, “Life Changes” has become an unqualified hit. His third platinum selling album, it entered the all-genre Billboard 200 chart at No, 1 and will vie for Album of the Year honors against releases by Chris Stapleton, Kacey Musgraves, Keith Urban and Dierks Bentley at the Country Music Association awards in November. Rhett is also up for the CMA Male Vocalist of the Year.

He has been able to celebrate that success with headlining tours last spring and this fall and well as a series of support dates for Kenny Chesney over the summer.

“With Kenny, we did 17 football and baseball stadiums, so when you go from playing for 15,000 people to all of a sudden playing for 60,000 people, it is a gigantic leap. I was just trying to figure out how I could take what I learned from entertaining an arena and triple it so we can reach the people in the top back portion of the stadium the same way you would play to the front row. But I feel I got to learn from the best with Kenny. We’ve been in rehearsal for two weeks now trying to dial it back in for the arenas.”

Then again, Rhett has been learning from the pros all his life. His father is country star Rhett Akins, who scored several hits in the ‘90s, the most prominent being 1996’s “Don’t Get Me Started.” His full name is Thomas Rhett Akins, Sr. The son playing Rupp this week was born Thomas Rhett Akins, Jr.

“Obviously, my love of music comes from my dad,” Rhett said. “I was born in Georgia, but we moved to Nashville in 1995. That’s when my dad signed a record deal and put out his first record. I would be dying to get out of school on Fridays so I could get on the bus and hang out with him on the road.

“My dad is a walking jukebox. He can sing every ‘80s hair metal song without looking at Google. On the way to school, he would play something different for us every morning, whether it was Hank (Williams), Willie (Nelson) or Waylon (Jennings) or AC/DC or bluegrass or Aretha Franklin or The Beatles or The Rolling Stones. He would always take me and my sisters to rock ‘n’ roll shows as well as country shows. I think he was just trying to make us musically aware.

“That’s where so many of the influences in my music come from, but with country music always being my first love. So I took it upon myself to figure out how I could incorporate all these things into my own brand and making it my own thing.”

If you go:

Thomas Rhett/Brett Young/Midland

When: 7:30 p.m. Oct. 4

Where: Rupp Arena, 430 W. Vine

Tickets: $30.25-$179

Call: 859-233-3535

Online: rupparena.com, thomasrhett.com

This story was originally published September 28, 2018 at 9:18 AM.