Here’s a sneak peek at Parade’s August 8th cover story featuring Kenny Chesney. The country star talks candidly about why he decided to take a year off from the spotlight. Plus, how high school football changed everything for Kenny and helped him put the passion back into his life and career.  Kenny recently produced a documentary about the impact of high school football, The Boys of Fall, due to air on ESPN this fall.

Last fall, something inside Chesney changed, and shortly after he announced he was taking a year off of touring…

“I was standing onstage last year, and I felt like I wanted to be somewhere else. No matter how many people were out there, it all just felt like a blank sheet of paper. You’d think I’d have been happiest in my life playing music in front of 50,000 people at Gillette Stadium. But let me tell you, it’s an odd feeling to feel alone in the spotlight.”

Kenny also dishes to Parade about his brief marriage to Renee Zellwegger and the dating game today.

“The world is a different place now. I mean, if I go out with a girl, there is a possibility that she’s going to get up from the dinner table and go to the bathroom and use Twitter to tell everybody what she’s doing. And the next thing you know, everybody’s got a play-by-play of what you’re having for dinner. That would make anybody uncomfortable.”

There’s much more! Go now to Parade.com/chesney for all the details!

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Kenny Chesney had a love-hate relationship with his football helmet in high school. That’s where he’d see evidence he was losing his hair. He tells Parade magazine when he was 17 or 18 he’d take his helmet off on the field and he’d see hair in it.  Kenny says he’d ask himself “what’s going on?” He says going bald did bother him in college a little bit. But, it doesn’t bother him now. He says friends of his in their 30s and 40s are just starting to lose their hair “and are freaking out.” But, he says he “went through all that in high school.”

Kenny graces the cover of Sunday’s (August 8th) Parade magazine where you can read the full interview that includes Kenny talking football, fond childhood memories and feeling alone despite being adored by millions of fans.

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