Dierks Bentley

“Being married is one thing, but having kids will completely change you. I still go out and hang with my buddies, but having two daughters will completely change your perspective on the world.”

“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 can act... well, kind of. I'm comfortable in front of a camera.”

“I'm surrounded by all these strong women - my publicist, my manager, and my wife - and sometimes I think that women are more evolved than men, and they are able to process a heartache better.”

“Seven has always been my lucky number. It's on my guitar pick; in sports, that was always the number I was, and 'Riser' is my seventh album. With this album kind of coming to an end and having seven nominations at the ACMs, it feels like a bigger story in play for me, and it's the perfect number. I wouldn't have wanted eight!”

“I don't think my music has changed to reflect getting married or having kids. But... if you want to continue to write your own songs, you've got to find deeper stuff to write about. You've got to go to different places.”

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

“It's hard to make music when you're not excited about it. So trying new things and going for new things is something that I can enjoy doing.”

“I do see the world as being different for girls - especially now, having daughters.”

“Everyone talks about new love all the time, but there's so much to draw from when you've been in a longer relationship. It makes me stick my chest out a little bit. It's like, 'I know what you've been through, but you don't know what it's like over here.'”

“I still feel like that 17-year-old-kid that fell in love with country music, but I also am allowed to write songs about being a man, too, which I think is the coolest place I've ever been in my life.”

“My guitar, it was new when I got it, but it has a hole like Willie's where it's just worn out from my pinky going back and forth over the wood over all these years. I got Willie Nelson to sign that spot on my guitar. I'm a huge fan of him.”

“I'm a member of the George Jones fan club, and I'm a member of U2's fan club.”

“The people I always loved listening to had a little bit of dirt under their fingernails because they had done some living and had these stories to talk about.”

“I was like, 'Man, bluegrass - that's like Roy Clark playing banjo on 'Hee Haw.' I'm a huge 'Hee Haw' fan. But I didn't know about bluegrass. It seemed like old people's music.”

“I put a lot of pressure on myself. I tell my wife when she's listening to my songs that the slightest hint of whether she likes it or not puts the pressure on me.”

“I love bluegrass music, I love acoustic music, and I try at the right times to push that a little bit.”

“When I was 13, I was just figuring out how to play 'Eruption,' poorly, by Eddie Van Halen.”

“I try to make an album that reflects what I love about country music. It's not just all about happy parties all the time. There are some sad songs.”

“Country music is always changing but the Opry is always there to serve as a lighthouse for what country music really is. The past, present and future is all encompassed by not only the physical structure of the building but also the radio show.”