Kenny Chesney’s ‘Rich and Miserable’ Comes With Equally Raw Lyric Video

Kenny Chesney is definitely taking a risk with "Rich and Miserable," but all signs point to it paying off. In his lyric video, Chesney trades out beach bonfires for city streets shot in black and white, and individual people write the poignant words on chalkboards as the edgy track plays.

The collective American experience about which Chesney sings is personified in the diversity of people who appear in the video, each from different walks of life and representing different perspectives, all coming together to proclaim the same message. The "Rich and Miserable" lyrics paint a picture of a country bent on newer, better, bigger, more — and explain that it’s tearing us apart.

“We won’t be happy ’til we’re rich and miserable,” Chesney sings, “and maybe we’ll get it."

The clever verses list out imagery that construct our current lifestyles, using the anticipating rhyming word at the end of phrases to begin the next phrase. “Rich and Miserable” — dubbed in a press release Chesney’s “most musically ambitious track yet” — appears on Chesney’s upcoming Cosmic Hallelujah album, which experienced a name-change late in the game. The record promises to include more unique style shifts like this one. Thus far Chesney has shared a duet with pop star Pink called “Setting the World on Fire" and a hit single called “Noise."

Cosmic Hallelujah drops Oct. 28.

Chesney wrapped his Spread the Love Tour this summer and was recently honored by BMI for his “profound influence” on the entertainment industry with the performing rights organization’s President’s Award, which he will receive Nov. 1. He was also recently announced as the headliner at the 2017 Country Jam Festival in Colorado.

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