Gwen Stefani is happy to ride Blake Shelton’s coattails to earn her own taste of country success. The “Hollaback Girl” singer thanked her husband for helping her break into the country music world with their two hit duet singles, “Nobody But You” and “Happy Anywhere.”
Stefani made the comments during an outdoor event where Warner Music Nashville and BMI celebrated Shelton scoring his 27th and 28th number one country hits with the two songs.
“Blake Shelton, thank you for letting me ride your coat tails all this time,” Stefani told Shelton at the Sept. 9 event before Shelton played at Bridgestone Arena, reports PEOPLE. “I truly am a fish out of water. I’m from Orange County, but I’m wearing cowboy boots for this.
I am such a fan of songwriting and writers.” Stefani said she cried when Shelton asked her to sing on “Happy Anywhere” because she was so excited and felt the song described their relationship.
Shelton admitted that he was not sure about releasing both duets simultaneously because he didn’t think country radio would approve of it. After “Nobody But You” topped the charts, he had a conference call with his team about what should be his next single, and they all agreed “Happy Anywhere” could still succeed.
Shelton now said that he and Warner Music Nashville executives laughed at Stefani’s inclusion on all his singles. This year also marked the 20th anniversary of Shelton’s first number-one single, “Austin,” which was featured on his self-titled debut album.
“We’re just at the beginning of this journey,” John Esposito, Warner Music Nashville CEO, told PEOPLE. “I know in our pocket we have what will be his 29th No. 1 song.”
Shelton and Stefani met on The Voice and started dating in 2015. After five years of being together, Shelton and Stefani got engaged in 2020. They were married on July 3, 2021. During their wedding ceremony, Shelton played a new song called “Reach the Star” in place of traditional vows.
Shelton did this rare thing, as he hasn’t been writing his own songs in a while. Stefani kept pushing him to write more songs. Craig Wiseman helped him to prepare the song for the ceremony. Shelton admitted that he had recorded the song but has not yet said whether he will release it.
Stefani was surprised by the song at her wedding. “She didn’t know I was going to do that,” Shelton stated in July. “And so I surprised her with the song and we actually just recorded the song here in Nashville yesterday. I don’t know what, or when we’re going to do something with it, but it’s something that I wanted to have a recording of.”