Keith UrbanLast week saw the release of Keith Urban’s Flow State, a record whose arrival was as unexpected as its content, with the country icon turning yacht rock for a change.
Indeed, Flow State is Urban’s first covers album. “There is one original on the record. It’s a thematic record… yacht rock songs,” he told attendees of 2026 Country Radio Seminar at Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium in March. “You think I’m kidding? I’m not kidding.”
Featuring renditions of songs by Seals & Crofts, Stephen Bishop, Robbie Dupree, and even Australia's own Little River Band, the record is capped off by a sole original – We Go Back – featuring yacht rock icon Michael McDonald.
However, while its arrival was unexpected, so too was its conception, as Urban told iHeartCountry Australia’s Justin Thomson in Nashville recently.
“People go, ‘Oh, I didn't expect a yacht rock record,’” Urban explained. “So I didn't expect a yacht rock record from me either. There was no strategy, there was no smart thinking of conceptualising something. It was none of that.”
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As he explains, he bought a studio in Nashville in 2024, and just before heading out on the world tour in support of that year’s High album, he decided to get a band together and record a few songs.
“We went in the studio and just said, ‘Just for fun, we'll just do a couple of yacht rock songs in one day,’” Urban notes. “That was all it was. I think we did On And On, Magnet & Steel maybe, and I just sort of thought, ‘Oh, great. Well, that was good. Everything works. Studio sounds great. Good.’
“And [producer] Dann Huff, who was with me, he's like, ‘Man, it's actually really, really good. It seems to really suit you. Maybe we'll do a couple more when you come back off the road.’
“So two became three, became five, and it just kept growing and growing, and I was shocked that I was making a whole album.”
Of course, the main question many fans might have asked Urban – as Thomson himself did – is, “Why yacht rock?” Why not an album of country classics? “It's just because they're easy and fun, and familiar,” Urban summarises.
As he points out, when working with a group of session players, it’s easier to work with songs that are well-known rather than having to write out or source the chords that each musician will have to play.
The benefit of yacht rock songs is that they’re well known, and therefore easy to work with, but as Urban explains, his whole catalogue has been strongly influenced by the genre.
“First and foremost, it was just doing those songs because they're really fun to sing,” he notes. “They're really fun to play, they're well-written, they're really well arranged. So all the heavy lifting has been done. So it was kind of efficiency to do those songs because of that.
“But the more I got into it, the more I realised these things are probably deeper in my songwriting DNA than I realised. And I looked at songs like Kiss A Girl, Sweet Thing, ‘Til Summer Comes Around, and a lot of the songs I've written, they're not that far removed from a lot of these melodies and song structure.
“So I think the reason why it fit was was because a lot of my music already comes from it.”
Similarly, one might think it would take some getting used to for an artist like Urban to whittle down a list of favourite yacht rock songs for an album such as thing. In reality, however, it was a simple process.
“It's interesting because it's the first covers album I've ever done,” he explains, “but really, when I make my own albums, I'm always doing something I didn't write.
“I mean, I didn't write Blue Ain't Your Color, I didn't write You'll Think Of Me, I didn't write Making Memories Of Us. I've recorded lots of songs I didn't write. This is just another album of songs I didn't write.
“But I have a visceral reaction to them, like they feel right,” he continues. “Picking up a guitar and playing Blue Ain't Your Color felt right, picking up a guitar and playing Steal Away felt right. So picking up a guitar and playing What A Fool Believes didn't feel right, or picking it up and playing Biggest Part Of Me by Ambrosia.
“There's a lot of songs that I vocally don't suit, they don't suit me,” he adds. “So I just chose everything that felt like a good pair of jeans and a T-shirt.”
While the record is out in the world now, Urban notes that upcoming live shows will likely feature one or two songs from the record in the sets. However, though there’s no plans for it yet, he’d love to do an intimate run of shows in which he offers up the whole record in full.
“I would love to do a specific little mini tour of smaller venues and play the album top to bottom,” he teases.
Keith Urban’s Flow State is out now.
