In the first and only definitive biography of country music star Keith Urban, insider Jeff Apter chronicles how a skinny, shy high school dropout with an outrageous mullet went from humble origins in Australia to conquering Nashville and global stardom–plus his struggles with addiction, marriage to Nicole Kidman, turns on American Idol, and more.

Four Grammys. Twenty US Number Ones. A Hollywood marriage. Who wouldn’t want to be Keith Urban?

Keith Urban came from humble origins. His father worked at the local landfill and Keith was a high school dropout. But Keith had a plan: conquer Nashville. “It’s my destiny,” he said. And Keith was hell-bent on scaling that musical Everest. Whatever it took.

It didn’t come easy. Keith served his apprenticeship in the beer barns of Australia, and his early trips to America were disastrous. But he never gave up, settling in Nashville in the 1990s and forming The Ranch. When the band fell apart, so did Keith, ending up in rehab (not for the last time). But Keith did eventually reach the top, through a combination of talent, charisma, sex appeal, dogged perseverance—and skin thick enough for a rhino. And along the way he married Nicole Kidman.

As Keith has said, “All those detours, the really dark ones, got me to where I am now. I would not want to change one leaf on any tree in the whole journey.”

Keith Urban is the definitive biography of an international superstar.