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Brantley Gilbert is now a father of three, and even he can’t believe it.
“There’s a large chapter of my life where I didn’t plan on being anybody’s dad or anybody’s husband,” Gilbert, 40, tells PEOPLE from his home in Nashville ahead of kicking off his latest tour on Thursday night. “So yeah, having life turn out like this has been really special. God has blessed me so much more than I deserve.”
Granted, before the multi-platinum country-rock welcomed his children Barrett, Braylen and Abram, he was blessed with their mother: his now-wife, Amber.
“I’m proud of the life we have built, and she’s obviously a huge part in that,” Gilbert says of his wife, who made major headlines in October when she delivered their third child on Gilbert’s tour bus while he was performing a concert in Mississippi. “Amber is probably the biggest part in that. I always count my blessings.”
It’s these sweet blessings that find themselves under the hard edges of the music contained on Gilbert’s new album Tattoos, which includes collabs with everyone from Ashley Cooke to Struggle Jennings to Rascal Flatts’ Gary LeVox.
“Gary and I have been friends for years. We’re both mama’s boys. We always said if we did a song together that it’d be one that our moms would be proud of, and they could listen to it without any cuss words being bleeped out,” Gilbert explains, laughing. “So, we landed on ‘God Isn’t Country.’ It’s a really special song to me and having him on there is just an honor.”
Snagging even more attention is the cover of Tattoos, which features Gilbert sans shirt and showing off his collection of extensive tattoos emblazoned on his body.
“If you’d have told me I’d be topless on an album cover the year before I turned 40, I would say you were crazy,” remarks Gilbert of the cover of his seventh studio album. “I had no idea we were taking those pictures that day. I wish they would’ve given me a heads up so I could have got in the gym a little bit. But old boy’s on there looking a little bit pudgy!” He laughs. “It’s all good. I’m allowed to have a little bit of pudge now. I’m a dad.”
And while the revealing picture on the album cover of Tattoos shows off the names of Gilbert’s children Barrett and Braylen, he’s not quite sure where and when he’s going to get a tattoo of his newest baby’s moniker.
“We weren’t planning on having a number three,” Gilbert admits with a laugh, referring to the dwindling space on his chest for another tattoo. “There’s a bit of space on my back, so we all know what’s happening there.”
Gilbert says he’s also not sure what exactly he has hanging from his mouth on the album cover.
“I don’t know if that’s a cigarette or a joint,” he interjects. “This leads me to believe it might’ve been a joint. I’m supposed to quit the tobacco at 40.” (He hit the milestone late last month.)
Certainly, the “One Hell of an Amen” hitmaker seems to find himself at yet another crossroads of his life, as the arrival of another new life seems to remind him once again that life itself is all too short.
“I’d love to be optimistic about [quitting smoking] and tell you that’s going to happen — it probably should,” says Gilbert. “This stuff isn’t giving me more longevity, but at the same time, God almighty, I think stress is going to kill me before anything. Trying to quit in the middle of everything going on right now would probably kill me.”
Gilbert’s true feelings about “everything going on right now” most certainly bleed through the lyrics of many a song on Tattoos but comes through the strongest on “Me and My House” ft. Struggle Jennings and Demun Jones.
“Given the current climate of our society, a lot of people are going to politicize it,” says Gilbert, who recently began “going to church again.” “When I look at the world today and the missing pieces, I can’t help but attribute a lot of it to the loss of what the family unit is. I’d love to see a return to that. My hope is that a lot of people can relate to that song.”
Gilbert begins The Tattoos Tour on Feb. 27 in Everett, Wash. For more information and to purchase tickets, click here.
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