Blake Shelton Talks About Divorce and New Music With ‘Billboard’

Blake Shelton is never one to hold back with his words no matter the subject. The country star got real honest with Billboard about what’s been going on with his life in the past handful of years and how every event drastically influenced his music on his latest album, If I’m Honest.

Known for his quick wit and hilarious banter as a coach on The Voice as well as his redneck persona in his songs, Shelton has risen to the top of the country game among some other huge names. But even when his career was at an apex, his publicized divorce from fellow country artist Miranda Lambert in 2015 made it a rough year to be in the recording studio.

“When we recorded the vocals for some of these songs, I was only six months removed from when all the crap went down,” Shelton said to Billboard. “When you have a broken heart — at least, when I do — you got to get it out of your system. You want people to sympathize with you. I was at rock bottom, in the middle of hell.”

It even got to the point, Shelton admitted, where he went and stayed with a good friend of his that Voice fans may admire: Adam Levine.

“As close as we have been, we got even closer,” said Shelton.

Of course, Shelton’s new love interest has created quite the hubbub as well. While pop/ska singer Gwen Stefani and Shelton don’t seem to match up right on paper, they’ve made a love connection deeper than most due to their understandings of each other’s personal lives. Shelton explained that the day he told all of The Voice stars about his turbulent relationship with his then wife, Stefani began to tear up over the news and the honesty blossomed into an incredible friendship.

“That’s kind of how our friendship and bond started, that day,” he said. “It went from that, to checking in on each other once a week through email — ‘This shit happened to me, what happened to you?’ — to maybe three times a week, then every day, to ‘Hey, here’s my phone number if you ever want to text.’ Next thing I know, I wake up and she’s all I care about, and I’m ­wondering if she feels the same about me.”

After telling the publication that Stefani “saved his life” post-divorce, Shelton got back on track with his music to make a record deeper than he had ever gone before. The honesty worked in his favor as If I’m Honest landed him a No. 1 spot on the Billboard Top Album Sales Chart with 153,000 copies sold in the first week.

Shelton is currently out on tour at the moment with his next show scheduled for July 30 in Canada. Fans can find more information and dates about the tour on Shelton’s website.