When I got to Nashville, people started asking me about how I got into country music. I'd tell them I came from a place where people wore cowboy hats for a real reason.

Growing up in Arizona, I love fireworks, shooting off bottle rockets and M80s.

I've had fans and friends in the business say, 'Oh man, you've made it.' I still don't feel like I've made it. I still feel like I'm as good as my last show, as good as my last single.

As soon as I got into country music, it was like hook, line and sinker. I was so focused on country, I ended up leaving all those '80s hair-band CDs behind - which now I still wish I had, but I was done with it.

I was 17, and a friend said, 'Man, you've got to listen to this song,' and he played 'Man to Man.' From there on, I was hooked on country. Garth Brooks, Alan Jackson, Clint Black. Every show that came through America West Arena, I was there.

If people sneak into my show, that's a sign of a good show, you know? If people want to risk getting in trouble with the law to come see you play music, that's a sign you're doing something right.

I go from being in front of 2,000 people, shot-gunning beers on stage and acting like a complete idiot, to being in a Mommy and Me class, waving a little pink handkerchief around 12 hours later!

If I'm not on stage, I'm a pilot. I like flying planes; I have a little plane back in Nashville.

When I'm done with all of this, I'm going to write a book on it: have a guide to having a life and being on the road. Especially having a family and being on the road.

Meeting my wife changed everything; it really, in the long run, made me a much better artist, a much better songwriter, a much better maker of albums.

Music is my first love, and I can't step away from her. I love music, and I love playing and living the dream, but I also miss my family.

I wrote a song called 'Here on Earth,' and the hook is, 'There's no answers here on earth.' Basically, searching for the 'why' when someone passes away, and I feel really fortunate that my dad lived as long as he did. But no matter what happens or how it happens, it's certainly a stinker.

There should be a whole book written about that one word: country. What does that mean, country? It's such a huge umbrella. I would hope that what makes it country is that it all starts with a song. The story being told in three and a half minutes that is not being told on another station.

The transformation that happens when a young artist goes on the road - you put the acoustic guitar down and start to play the electric a little louder - it gets a little bit ragged.

I've known my wife since we were 13 years old in eighth grade, and we kinda dated each other's best friends. The four of us always hung out, but I really wanted her. We dated around 17, but I was no way mature enough for her.

It's Frederick Dierks Bentley, but my whole family goes by their middle name - my sister, my brother. So from day one, I've always been called Dierks.

Hey, if someone is crushing on me, and it brings them out to the show, so be it!

I don't tour to make money: I do it because I love it. When I'm putting a tour together, I'm not sitting with number-crunchers, having them tell me I can't do this or that.

Love always had my number. I could never patch a breakup together with whiskey and a one-night stand. I took them real hard.

I'm on stage 13. I'm at that can't-be-replaced stage. The transformation I've been through personally with my wife is amazing, but having two girls and a boy, man, that's the painful stuff.

I try to make my box as big as it can be because I never want to do the same thing twice.

I discovered early on that I was more of a strummer than a picker.

I never met Johnny Cash personally, but I feel like I did because I listened to so much of his music, and even though he's gone, it's still there: you can go pull a vinyl record out and hear his personal thoughts and his voice and feel connected to him.

I wrote that song 'Black,' and it was just this idea that I had been married for 10 years. Everyone talks about 'happily ever after,' but there's so much more to it than that.