Chesney gets the "60 Minutes" treatment

"There's something about '60 Minutes'," said Chesney. "It's just a whole other level, of, well, all of it. The questions, the way they committed to shooting us...It was as much about trying to get a sense of how it feels out there as it was just showing people what happens...and Anderson is a great interviewer."

Cooper and his team, including producer John Hamlin sought to balance the superstar of Chesney with that of a pensive songwriter.

"We were all so tired when we got the call," Chesney remembers, "and I think I wanted to know - because these opportunities are once in a career, and I realize that - that I was gonna be good enough. When you get that far into a tour, you're mentally a little burned... and when you sit down to do that interview, it's not like you've got 20,000 people giving you their energy if you're a bit worn out."

"But you know, sometimes you gotta do it in the moment. And Anderson was willing to really play along... The look on his face when I dragged him up onstage in Detroit at the stadium show, he was scared to death, this guy who gets shot at in combat zones, but I also know he knows what it's like to have that coming at you."