Tim McGraw's 2009 CD, Southern Voice. Photo by Danny Clinch, courtesy of Curb Records.

"For me, making a record isn’t just going in and having fun," says Tim McGraw. "It’s going in and digging and digging and trying to get what’s inside of me out, and never quite getting there. And that’s what keeps you going back and trying again."

This dedication to honesty and integrity has helped make Tim not just a country music superstar, but one of the biggest names in all of music today. In his record-shattering career, Tim has sold over 40 million albums, and dominated the charts with 30 No. 1 singles. Since the release of his debut album in 1993, he has won three Grammys, 14 Academy of Country Music Awards, 11 Country Music Association Awards, and 10 American Music Awards, while simultaneously maintaining a parallel career as a successful actor.

Now, with the release of Southern Voice—his tenth studio album, and his first in over two years—Tim is extending his achievements even further. Recorded with his longtime producer, Byron Gallimore (Faith Hill, Sugarland), the disc’s 12 songs represent a new level of depth and intensity for the singer from the small town of Start, Louisiana; they tell unforgettable stories of lives lived and lessons learned, and reveal a man staring down what it means to be a father, a husband, a Southerner.

Tim says, though, that the album’s strong sense of maturity wasn’t entirely intentional. "I don’t go out looking for that kind of material," he says. "As an artist, you just put your antennae up, and you find and record whatever you’re drawn to. Of course, everything in your life factors into what you choose. So you might not notice any theme as you’re making an album, but once it’s done, then you look back and get a better picture of where you were as a person at the time."

Among the territory explored by Tim on Southern Voice is aging and mortality (on songs like "If I Died Today" and "Forever Seventeen") and the relationships between parents and children ("You Had to Be There," "I Love You Goodbye"). These concepts aren’t new for the man behind "Live Like You Were Dying," but they continue to add weight and perspective over time.

"Those things are part of my life, and they get a little more in-depth the older I get," he says. "Both of my fathers are dead now. Some things hit a little harder than if they were still around—but it can also make you a little softer in some ways, too."

Of course, not all of Southern Voice is such serious business. The album’s first single, "It’s a Business Doing Pleasure With You," is a cranked-up lament about the financial tolls of romance. The title track, meanwhile, is nothing less than a modern anthem, an irresistible celebration of the joys and contributions of the American South.

"It reminded me of songs from earlier in my career," Tim says. "Something like ‘Down on the Farm’—it has those kind of sentiments, but said in a more mature, more lived-in way. It says a lot without you realizing it’s saying it to you." No question, "Southern Voice" has to be the first song to shout out Hank Williams and Rosa Parks, Michael Jordan and William Faulkner. ("It’s a different time," says Tim, "and people embrace all of those things now.")