Keith Urban remembers when success was “just around the corner”: “They just kept moving the corner”

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ABC/Mark Levine

Keith Urban is arguably at the pinnacle of his career so far, as the reigning Entertainer of the Year for both the Country Music Association and the Academy of Country Music.

But Keith hasn’t forgotten what it was like to be a struggling artist. The Aussie superstar recalls that even then, it seemed he got just enough encouragement to keep on going.

“I didn’t have any choice,” he laughs. “I didn’t really have a backup plan, you know.”

“[Success] was always happening more than it [previously] was, you know,” Keith explains. “So that it always, right as it felt like, ‘Man, I’m just hittin’ my head against a brick wall and nothing’s happening,’ there’d be a little break of some sort.”

“Even if it was tiny,” he continues, “there’d be like ‘Okay, there’s a little momentum forward,’ and that always kept me going.”

The “We Were” hitmaker remembers what it was like sensing a breakthrough was coming.

“I always felt like, ‘What I’m trying to do is just around the corner,’ and they just kept moving the corner,” he jokes. “But it was always just there, and so I just sort of [kept following] the dangling carrot…”

Says Keith, “I just kept going and eventually they stopped moving the corner.”

On Friday, Keith plays Good Morning America‘s Summer Concert Series in New York City’s Central Park. You can tune in to watch starting at 7 a.m. on ABC.

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