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Dolly Parton may have a career in professional cheerleading if this music thing doesn’t work out. The 77-year-old country superstar stunned during the NFL halftime show at the Dallas Cowboys-Washing Commanders game on Thanksgiving (Nov. 23) after stepping onto the stage in a sparkling Cowboys-inspired cheerleader uniform for her show-stealing set. “Hello, Texas! Dolly does […]
On Black Friday (Nov. 24), Garth Brooks will give fans an early look at his Friends in Low Places Bar & Honky-Tonk in downtown Nashville, opening the bar with his own “dive bar” concert taking place at the new venue.
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The Amazon Music Live special concert will be livestreamed for everyone to watch, beginning at 7 p.m. ET and available via Amazon Prime Video and the Amazon Music channel on Twitch — even for those without an Amazon Prime subscription or an Amazon account. Additionally, the Black Friday NFL game between the Miami Dolphins and the New York Jets will transition directly into the concert following the game. Over on Twitch, a pre-show will begin at 6 p.m. ET, hosted by Amber Anderson and Kelly Sutton, who spearhead Amazon Music’s Country Heat Weekly podcast.
The Country Music Hall of Famer’s Friends in Low Places Bar & Honky-Tonk, located at 411 Broadway in Nashville, is the latest country artist-owned bar to dot downtown Nashville, joining venues from Florida Georgia Line, Dierks Bentley, Jason Aldean, Luke Bryan, Alan Jackson and Miranda Lambert, among others.
During a press conference held at his new Friends in Low Places Bar in Nashville, Brooks noted that his Black Friday concert will welcome a special guest: Ronnie Dunn, who will join Brooks to perform their current radio duet “Rodeo Man” together live for the first time. The duet is included on Brooks’ new album Time Traveler and debuted in the top 30 on Billboard‘s Country Airplay chart.
In a nod to the venue’s namesake song, “Friends in Low Places,” two towering palm trees overlooking the venue’s massive, retractable stage are named for the songwriters behind Brooks’ signature hit: Earl Bud Lee and Dwayne Blackwell. “Friends in Low Places,” included on Brooks’ 1990 album No Fences, spent four weeks atop Billboard‘s Hot Country Songs chart. The song was also named single of the year by both the Country Music Association and the Academy of Country Music.
Brooks explained his reasoning behind opting to name the bar after his signature song rather than simply license his name. “Hopefully as an artist is you realize that the song outlives the artist,” Brooks said. “So that’s why it’s not ‘The Garth Bar.’ It’s Friends in Low Places. … You can like Garth Brooks, you can not like Garth Brooks. Either way, chances are you’ve probably sang ‘Friends in Low Places’ at a wedding or something with everybody else.”
He also noted that, similar to his previous Dive Bar concerts in other cities, this will be a truncated performance, expected to wrap in under an hour.
Brooks also noted that the bar won’t fully open until March 2024, though the two bottom floors will be open during the soft opening on Friday and on weekends leading up to the March 2024 full opening.
However, don’t expect to see Brooks doing pop-up shows at the bar; he told reporters during the press conference that he wants to keep the focus on the bar being a place for the next generation of artists to hone their skills. He also noted to Billboard that he doesn’t plan to be involved in selecting the artists and/or bands who perform at the bar.
“My thing is, let’s get as many people in here. The more people get to play, the more chances new people get,” he told Billboard, noting that the stage is also retractable. “There’s a green room to show a little bit of what the future is for them, and of course, everything’s about the crew.”
The Oklahoma native also noted the venue’s location is full-circle for him. The building used to be known as Paradise Park Trailer Park bar, and the rooftop is where Brooks celebrated in 2019 after winning his seventh CMA entertainer of the year accolade.
Brooks said that his motivation to launch the Friends in Low Places Bar & Honky-Tonk ultimately stems from a desire to give back to Nashville’s community.
“We are part of the ‘Neon neighborhood’ down here, inviting everyone to Lower Broad. I want this to be a good thing for Lower Broadway.”
On Thursday (Nov. 23), thousands of gatherings will bring together families and friends to enjoy a day of fellowship and food. According to a Pew Research Center survey, 73% of U.S. adults say family time is one of the most important aspects of their life. When it comes to the foods spread out on Thanksgiving […]
When families get together across America for Thanksgiving on Nov. 23, one of the key elements beneath the drumsticks, gravy and pumpkin pie is an appreciation for the people who had the biggest role in making us who we are.
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Or, at least, that’s how we think it’s supposed to be. In many households, the gathering will be a contest to see how long the day goes before long-held internal feuds spiral into arguments. And in other residences, relatives will recall the mom — or the uncle or the spouse — who’s no longer around, and regret will set in about not making the best use of the time while they were here.
In that spirit, Jay Allen’s “No Present Like the Time” serves as a reminder about living life to the fullest, a kind of Hallmark card that urges the listener to get the most out of every moment while it’s still possible.
Allen knows something about it. His mom died of early-onset Alzheimer’s disease in February 2019. As he trudged forward in the aftermath, he realized he had missed some opportunities — to ask questions, share a story or simply say, “I love you.” He mostly held his chin up, but when he competed on NBC’s The Voice, he was stuck in a lonely hotel room with only occasional 10-minute breaks. He used the isolation to finally start processing his grief, and the hurt began evolving into gratitude for what she had left him. He soon realized she would want him to get on with his life.
“I started thinking about the positives that I took from losing her,” he remembers. “This song came out of it.”
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Allen tried to write what became “No Present Like the Time” four or five times, but it never quite jelled. So he got in touch with songwriter Nate Kenyon and writer-producer-musician Micah Wilshire (Jason Aldean, Darius Rucker), and met them during a break from The Voice at Wilshire’s backyard studio in Nashville. Wilshire had just lost his father three months prior, and each of the writers felt a sense of purpose in the work.
“I remember talking about bits of wisdom I could leave my son and wisdom that maybe my dad left me, too,” says Wilshire. “Going along with what Jay’s story was, obviously, it was just kind of a raw day. But it was really cathartic.”
Wilshire played the foundational guitar for the co-write, and Kenyon contributed a simple melodic guitar line in the opening seconds that’s easily played on a single string. The opening verse was a sort of hodgepodge of ideas: “Take a picture, take a chance,” “Don’t hold your breath, hold your kids.” They didn’t form a particular narrative, though the images had a loose commonality.
“We weren’t really trying to have this progressive journey,” Kenyon remembers. “It was really like a gumbo pot of really important stuff.”
All those scattered thoughts led melodically to the chorus, where everything came into focus with a series of phrases about the tenuousness of the moment. “It can fade in a minute,” they warned, “no matter how you spin it.” The lines kept ticking toward the inevitable twist of the key phrase: “There’s no time like the present/ There’s no present like the time.”
But they didn’t stop there. Allen wanted to make the flip of the word “present” clear to the listener, so they threw in a post-chorus of short, stabbing phrases that underscored the new meaning: “It’s a gift, it’s all you get.” From that “gift” line, the post-chorus became a sort of mantra, concluding with a simple reminder: “Say ‘I love you.’ ”
“At first we were like, ‘We should do this as like a post- on the second chorus,’ ” recalls Wilshire. “And then I was like, ‘No, we should just do this every time as part of the elongated chorus.’ There’s enough meat to say that we feel like we should say it every time.”
The second verse took a philosophical tack -— “Help a stranger, help yourself/ Pull that Bible off the shelf” — that brings to mind the parable of the good Samaritan and ultimately encouraged the listener to remember what matters most. Then it rolled again into the chorus, with its focus on the urgency of the moment.
“All three of us have our own view of this song because we came from our own heads with it,” Wilshire says. “But part of it is the struggle of living in the now. It’s a struggle for everybody — really living, and being present, is so hard.”
They had said all that needed to be said, so they skipped writing a bridge, left space for a guitar solo and added one more swing through a down chorus that grew in intensity to close after two-and-a-half minutes.
Wilshire played most of the instrumental parts on the track — he overdubbed a crisp guitar solo later that night — but he purposely used Kenyon’s simple guitar part in the open and left some of the finger noise from playing the nylon strings on the track, too. “I am not a guitar player,” says Kenyon appreciatively. “I can strum, and I can do a little bit of picking, but you normally would never hear me playing guitar on a recording.”
Allen purposely over-enunciated on the vocals to make certain that the message connected with the listener. And he countered some of his rock background to deliver the song with an understated tone. “Miss Gwen Stefani on The Voice, she pulled me aside and was just like, ‘Jay, you don’t have to scream all the time,’ ” he says.
In all, it only took about 90 minutes for the three creatives to write “No Present” and get a rough recording down. “This is one of the songs [where] God’s a co-writer,” says Kenyon. “We didn’t overthink. We probably broke some of the normal writing rules, but it just felt good. And it felt right.”
Wilshire added some atmospheric guitar sounds that night and sang background vocals. And at a later date, when it came time to release it, Allen came back to Wilshire’s studio to rerecord the lead voice on a more expensive microphone. They ultimately decided the performance from the co-write had more heart and kept that version.
ONErpm released “No Present Like the Time” to digital outlets in 2022 and, after about a year, decided to bring it to country radio, issuing it via PlayMPE on Oct. 5. Allen also created a Christmas version, even though it’s not a holiday-specific song. Wilshire dropped light sleigh bells into the background and recorded a very basic keyboard part that lent a little extra dreaminess.
Allen, who joined the Alzheimer’s movement in his mother’s final years, has reportedly helped raise more than $100 million for the cause. “No Present Like the Time” has a sentiment that applies to an even wider community.
“My entire team realizes I have a message to convey, and that message is this song,” Allen says. “What I do as an artist really isn’t really about me. It’s about how can I utilize my little gift, my ability to write a song, to help people, to give back to someone, to make them feel not alone, to make them love the person next to them a little harder.”
It’s a good reminder at a time of Thanksgiving.
At age 90 and with more than seven decades of music under his belt, Texas native Willie Nelson is busier than ever. The 12-time Grammy winner was recently inducted into the Rock n’ Roll Hall of Fame on Nov. 3 and in September, he released Bluegrass, his first full-length album of bluegrass-styled music. The album has earned Nelson a Grammy nomination for best bluegrass album, leading into the 2024 ceremony.
On Dec. 17, CBS will present the music special Willie Nelson’s 90th Birthday Celebration, honoring the music icon with performances and collaborations from Nelson as well as Gary Clark Jr., Snoop Dogg, Miranda Lambert, Norah Jones, George Strait, Chris Stapleton, Keith Richards and Nelson’s sons Lukas Nelson and Micah Nelson. More top-tier stars will host, including Jennifer Garner, Chelsea Handler, Woody Harrelson, Ethan Hawke, Helen Mirren and Owen Wilson.
Nelson’s innovative songs, unique performance style and jazz-inspired, behind-the-beat style of phrasing, has made the iconoclast one of music’s most widely beloved artists, with 20 No. 1 hits on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart. His catalog of hits he penned for other artists includes “Night Life,” “Hello Walls,” “Crazy,” “Family Bible” and “Funny How Time Slips Away.” He earned his first top 10 country hits as an artist in the 1960s with “Touch Me” and “Willingly,” but it was 1975’s Red Headed Stranger that would garner Nelson his mainstream breakthrough. The album’s “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain” would earn Nelson his first Grammy award, and his first No. 1 hit on the Hot Country Songs chart.
In 1976, Nelson’s music was part of the compilation album Wanted! The Outlaws, which also included Tompall Glaser, Waylon Jennings, and Jessi Colter; the album became country music’s first album to be certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America. Nelson and Jennings’ hit collaborations include the 1976, three-week Hot Country Songs chart No. 1 hit “Good Hearted Woman” and 1978’s four-week No. 1 “Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys.”
A testament to his musical fluidity, Nelson’s albums over the years have paid homage to his Texas honky-tonk roots, but also included projects of pop standards (1978’s Stardust), tributes to Lefty Frizzell (1977’s To Lefty From Willie), Kris Kristofferson (1979’s Willie Nelson Sings Kristofferson), Cindy Walker (2006’s You Don’t Know Me: The Songs of Cindy Walker), Frank Sinatra (2021’s That’s Life) and George and Ira Gershwin (2016’s Summertime), and albums recorded with Ray Price, Roger Miller, Merle Haggard and Webb Pierce.
Nelson was named as the inaugural honoree of the Country Music Association’s Willie Nelson Lifetime Achievement Award in 2012. Three years later, Nelson became the first country artist to earn the Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Song.
Here, we look at Willie Nelson’s 25 biggest Billboard hits, from “Blues Eyes Cryin’ in the Rain” to “Beer For My Horses.”
Willie Nelson’s 25 Biggest Billboard Hits recap is based on actual performance on Billboard’s weekly Hot Country Songs chart. Songs are ranked based on an inverse point system, with weeks at No. 1 earning the greatest value and weeks at lower ranks earning less. To ensure equitable representation of the biggest hits from each era, certain time frames were weighted to account for the difference between turnover rates from those years.
“Heartbreak Hotel” (with Leon Russell)
When Dierks Bentley’s band is looking for something to keep it occupied during long bus rides, the group has, at times, turned to artificial intelligence apps, asking them to create album reviews or cover art for the group’s alter ego, The Hot Country Knights.
“So far,” guitarist Charlie Worsham says, “AI does not completely understand The Hot Country Knights.”
By the same token, Music Row doesn’t completely understand AI, but the developing technology is here, inspiring tech heads and early adaptors to experiment with it, using it to get a feel, for example, for how Bentley’s voice might fit a new song or to kick-start a verse that has the writer stumped. But it has also inspired a palpable amount of fear among artists anticipating their voices will be misused and among musicians who feel they’ll be completely replaced.
“As a songwriter, I see the benefit that you don’t have to shell out a ton of money for a demo singer,” one attendee said during the Q&A section of an ASCAP panel about AI on Nov. 7. “But also, as a demo singer, I’m like, ‘Oh, shit, I’m out of a job.’”
That particular panel, moderated by songwriter-producer Chris DeStefano (“At the End of a Bar,” “That’s My Kind of Night”), was one of three AI presentations that ASCAP hosted at Nashville’s Twelve Thirty Club the morning after the ASCAP Country Music Awards, hoping to educate Music City about the burgeoning technology. The event addressed the creative possibilities ahead, the evolving legal discussion around AI and the ethical questions that it raises. (ASCAP has endorsed six principles for AI frameworks here).
The best-known examples of AI’s entry into music have revolved around the use of public figures’ voices in novel ways. Hip-hop artist Drake, in one prominent instance, had his voice re-created in a cover of “Bubbly,” originated by Colbie Caillat, who released her first country album, Along the Way, on Sept. 22.
“Definitely bizarre,” Caillat said during CMA Week activities. “I don’t think it’s good. I think it makes it all too easy.”
But ASCAP panelists outlined numerous ways AI can be employed for positive uses without misappropriating someone’s voice. DeStefano uses AI program Isotope, which learned his mixing tendencies, to elevate his tracks to “another level.” Independent hip-hop artist Curtiss King has used AI to handle tasks outside of his wheelhouse that he can’t afford to outsource, such as graphic design or developing video ideas for social media. Singer-songwriter Anna Vaus instructed AI to create a 30-day social media campaign for her song “Halloween on Christmas Eve” and has used it to adjust her bio or press releases — “stuff,” she says, “that is not what sets my soul on fire.” It allows her more time, she said, for “sitting in my room and sharing my human experiences.”
All of this forward motion is happening faster in some other genres than it is in country, and the abuses — the unauthorized use of Drake’s voice or Tom Cruise’s image — have entertainment lawyers and the Copyright Office playing catch-up. Those examples test the application of the fair use doctrine in copyright law, which allows creators to play with existing copyrights. But as Sheppard Mullin partner Dan Schnapp pointed out during the ASCAP legal panel, fair use requires the new piece to be a transformative product that does not damage the market for the original work. When Drake’s voice is being applied without his consent to a song he has never recorded and he is not receiving a royalty, that arguably affects his marketability.
The Copyright Office has declined to offer copyright protection for AI creations, though works that are formed through a combination of human and artificial efforts complicate the rule. U.S. Copyright Office deputy general counsel Emily Chapuis pointed to a comic book composed by a human author who engaged AI for the drawings. Copyright was granted to the text, but not the illustrations.
The legal community is also sorting through rights to privacy and so-called “moral rights,” the originator’s ability to control how a copyright is used.
“You can’t wait for the law to catch up to the tech,” Schnapp said during the legal panel. “It never has and never will. And now, this is the most disruptive technology that’s hit the creative industry, generally, in our lifetime. And it’s growing exponentially.”
Which has some creators uneasy. Carolyn Dawn Johnson asked from the audience if composers should stop using their phones during writing appointments because ads can track typed and spoken activity, thus opening the possibility that AI begins to draw on content that has never been included in copyrighted material. The question was not fully answered.
But elsewhere, Nashville musicians are beginning to use AI in multiple ways. Restless Road has had AI apply harmonies to songwriter demos to see if a song might fit its sound. Elvie Shane, toying with a chatbot, developed an idea that he turned into a song about the meth epidemic, “Appalachian Alchemy.” Chase Matthew’s producer put a version of his voice on a song to convince him to record it. Better Than Ezra’s Kevin Griffin, who co-wrote Sugarland’s “Stuck Like Glue,” has asked AI to suggest second verses on songs he was writing — the verses are usually pedestrian, but he has found “one nugget” that helped finish a piece.
The skeptics have legitimate points, but skeptics also protested electronic instruments, drum machines, CDs, file sharing and programmed tracks. The industry has inevitably adapted to those technologies. And while AI is scary, early adopters seem to think it’s making them more productive and more creative.
“It’s always one step behind,” noted King. “It can make predictions based upon the habits that I’ve had, but there’s so many interactions that I have because I’m a creative and I get creative about where I’m going next … If anything, AI has given me like a kick in the butt to be more creative than I’ve ever been before.”
Songwriter Kevin Kadish (“Whiskey Glasses,” “Soul”) put the negatives of AI into a bigger-picture perspective.
“I’m more worried about it for like people’s safety and all the scams that happen on the phone,” he said on the ASCAP red carpet. “Music is the least of our worries with AI.”
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Morgan Wallen tops Billboard’s 2023 year-end Hot 100 Artists list, while “Last Night” leads the year’s Hot 100 Songs recap. Rania Aniftos:Morgan Wallen had a big year on the Billboard Hot 100, and as the year wraps up, it looks like the country star is at the top of a few year-end lists. Morgan Wallen […]
In 2020, Jessie Murph began regularly posting covers to YouTube and TikTok. They quickly gained a following, and ever since she’s been scoring one win after the next. She parlayed her early success with covers of Ariana Grande, Fleetwood Mac, Post Malone and others into a label deal with Columbia Records the following year. By the end of 2021, “Always Been You” — the lead single from her debut mixtape — became her first hit on the Billboard Hot 100.
Since then, the 19-year-old singer-songwriter has tallied three more entries on the chart: “Pray”; her Diplo and Polo G collaboration, “Heartbroken”; and most recently “Wild Ones” with Jelly Roll. The latest has already become her biggest hit to date, reaching a No. 42 high in six weeks on the ranking.
Over an inescapable country-driven groove, Murph and Jelly Roll romanticize risk-taking, rule-breaking daredevils with an affinity for fast cars and lifting their middle fingers high in the air. “Say you wanna get dangerous/ Now you’re speaking my language,” Murph sings.
The two musicians share a connection in more ways than one. Both are Nashville-area natives — though Murph’s family moved to Alabama when she was a child, she recently moved back to the Music City — and have continued to explore different genres throughout their careers, including country, hip-hop, pop and rock. For Jelly Roll (real name: Jason DeFord), “Need a Favor” and “Son of a Sinner” have been genre-fluid mainstays over the past year and have helped fuel a best new artist Grammy nomination and a win as new artist of the year at the recent CMA Awards.
“I think something that’s so special about him is he’s so always just so grateful,” Murph says of Jelly Roll. “You can tell he’s such a gratitude-based person and it’s beautiful. Jelly Roll has just been so positive and every time I’m around him I leave feeling so happy.”
How did this song come together?
It was such a long process. I feel like I made it months before it came out, and I never planned on having a feature on it. I was just going to put it out. But [at the] last minute, Jelly heard it and he was like, “I have a verse for this,” and I’m a huge fan of him. I went to one of his shows and sang a cover of “Simple Man” with him. Then I guess he heard “Wild Ones” and I was like, “Oh my God, please be on this.”
What inspired the song?
I’ve always been attracted to crazy things or chaos. That’s where the song came from. I don’t normally write fun songs, so it’s one of my first songs like that — really cool and different. I had been in a session all day and we had gotten nothing. In the last 30 minutes, I remember Gitty [producer/co-writer Jeff Gitelman] played this guitar lick and we ended up writing it super fast.
Once you were in the studio, were there any big changes made to the song?
We might’ve sped it up during the process to make it a little bit more groovy. But I really wanted country elements for this song — that was the palette I wanted to stay with. Stylistically, especially lately, I’ve been a little bit country leaning. I’m really inspired by country music, and I feel like it has found its way into my sound.
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How did you first hear Jelly Roll’s music?
My older brother is really into country [music], so he listens to a lot of that kind of stuff. I feel like we were just in the car and he had it on. I was like, “Whoa, this is insane.” But the craziest thing was seeing Jelly live. I was just blown away.
It feels like country music is everywhere this year, in different variations. Genres keep melding together in different ways. What is your take on that?
I think it’s beautiful. That has always been my thing as an artist: I don’t ever want to have a genre because I feel that boxes you in. As you get older and grow as a person, you listen to different types of music, and I think it’s beautiful when those things mix and intertwine. It creates a whole new vibe that people haven’t even heard. But I agree, country is exploding right now.
Who else would you want to collaborate with?
My dream collaboration is Lil Baby. I’ve always wanted to [make a song with him], and it’s going to happen at some point. I’m manifesting it. I’ve been obsessed with his music since I can remember. He’s just such a real person. I feel like he sings about real sh-t. I love his melodies, his flows.
A version of this story originally appeared in the Nov. 18, 2023, issue of Billboard.
Just as he did in 2021 and 2022, 30-year-old singer-songwriter Morgan Wallen is Billboard’s Top Country Artist. Concurrently, the Sneedville, Tenn.-born star is Billboard’s Top Country Artist – Male. He also wraps the year with No. 1 placings on the year-end recaps for Hot Country Songs, Hot Country Songs Artists, Country Airplay Artists, Country Airplay Songs, Country Digital Song Sales Artists, Country Streaming Songs, Country Streaming Songs Artists, Top Country Albums Artists and Top Country Albums.
Wallen won the day in plenty of categories in 2023, and if there’s one area where he added to his portfolio, it’s pop radio, where the country star is officially a crossover artist now on the strength of “Last Night,” which reached No. 5 on both Pop Airplay and Adult Pop Airplay.
Explore All of Billboard’s 2023 Year-End Charts
“Last Night,” which is the leading song of the year on the streaming-, airplay and sales based Hot Country Songs chart as well as the top Country Airplay track of the year, also became Wallen’s first song to top the all-genre Billboard Hot 100. It’s also the year-end No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 Songs recap.
In March, “Last Night” — which was authored by John Byron, Ashley Gorley, Jacob Kasher Hindlin and Ryan Vojtesak — blasted from 5-1 on the Hot 100, marking the artist’s first leader on the all-format list. “Last Night” is from his 36-track album, One Thing at a Time, released March 3.
When “Last Night” led the Hot 100 for its first week on the March 18 dated tally, it was also stationed atop Hot Country Songs.
It marked the first track to lead both tallies since Taylor Swift’s “All Too Well (Taylor’s Version)” on the charts dated Nov. 27, 2021 – and the first by a solo male unaccompanied by any other acts in more than 42 years, since Eddie Rabbitt’s “I Love a Rainy Night” ruled Hot Country Songs for a week in January 1981 and the Hot 100 for two weeks that February-March.
“Last Night” dominated Hot Country Songs for 25 frames commencing in February, becoming the fourth-longest-ruling title since the chart was launched in 1958. The longest is Bebe Rexha and Florida Georgia Line’s crossover smash, “Meant to Be,” which spent a whopping 50 weeks in the penthouse beginning in December 2017.
“Last Night” is also the year-end No. 1 on Country Airplay Songs. It dominated the weekly chart for eight weeks starting in May, giving the artist his ninth of 10 No. 1s. He added his 10th in October with “Thinkin’ Bout Me.”
Wallen’s One Thing at a Time album, which houses 36 songs, opened atop Top Country Albums as well as the all-genre Billboard 200 with the largest streaming week ever for a country album, as well as the biggest week by equivalent album units (501,000 in the tracking week of March 3-9, according to Luminate) for any album, among all genres.
The artist made history that week by taking over Hot Country Songs with an unprecedented nine tracks in that week’s top 10.
One Thing at a Time is both No. 1 on the year-end Top Country Albums recap and the all-genre Billboard 200 Albums roundup.
Swift Leads Women: On the strength of her release of Speak Now (Taylor’s Version), Taylor Swift is country music’s top woman of 2023. Speak Now is the No. 4 LP on the Top Country Albums list of the year.
Released July 7, the set — the third of Swift’s planned six re-recorded albums — arrived with 716,000 equivalent album units earned, with 507,000 in traditional album sales.
With Speak Now, Swift earned her eighth No. 1 on Top Country Albums. Also that week, Swift lobbed seven songs into the Hot Country Songs top 10.
Megan Moroney Shines: Singer-songwriter Megan Moroney, who hails from Savannah, Ga., scored her first top 10 on the weekly Top Country Albums chart in May when her first entry, Lucky, arrived at its No. 10 peak with 18,000 equivalent album units.
The set marked the first top 10 debut for a woman’s first title on the chart since Gabby Barrett’s debut LP Goldmine arrived at No. 4 in July 2020.
Moroney, a graduate of the University of Georgia, also claimed her first top 10 on Country Airplay as well as Hot Country Songs with rookie appearance “Tennessee Orange,” which hit No. 4 on Country Airplay and No. 10 on Hot Country Songs.
There’s no doubt that 2023 was a huge year for country music.
In July, country songs filled the top three rankings on the Hot 100: Jason Aldean’s “Try That in a Small Town” topped the list, followed by Wallen’s “Last Night,” with Luke Combs’ cover of Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car” at No. 3.
It marked the first time that country hits occupied the Hot 100’s top three spots in a single week, dating to the chart’s inception in August 1958.
A little controversy also hovered over one of country music’s top stars. Aldean’s “Try That in a Small Town” created a stir when its video was pulled from rotation by CMT after just three days on the air, creating a firestorm of media coverage.
Aldean addressed the polarized response to the video during his Highway Desperado Tour stop July 21 at Cincinnati’s Riverbend Music Center. “It’s been a long week and I’ve seen a lot of stuff suggesting I’m this, suggesting I’m that,” he told the crowd. “I feel like everybody’s entitled to their opinion. You can think something all you want to; it doesn’t mean it’s true. What I am is a proud American. I’m proud to be from here … I love my country, I love my family, and I will do anything to protect that, I can tell you that right now.”
The contention didn’t hurt sales. “Try That in a Small Town” is the No. 1 title for 2023 on Country Digital Song Sales. On the July 29 dated tally, “Small Town” hit No. 1 with 228,000 sold. It became Aldean’s first Hot 100 leader while also reigning on Hot Country Songs for two weeks, becoming the artist’s 10th No. 1 on the latter list.
Meanwhile, the No. 2 Hot Country Songs title of 2023 is Luke Combs’ version of Chapman’s Hot 100 top 10 from 1987, “Fast Car.”
Combs’ update of “Fast Car” led Hot Country Songs for its first of four weeks on the Sept. 30 dated survey giving the artist his sixth No. 1. Here’s what Combs told Billboard when he heard the news: “What an awesome way to end the ride for ‘Fast Car’,” said the artist. “It has been so cool to see everyone enjoying this song over the past few months, whether it was people who were hearing the song for the first time or people [for whom] it brought back memories of Tracy’s timeless recording. I’m just glad this song got another life because it deserves to be around forever; it will always be one of my favorites. I’m glad we got to park Tracy’s song at the top of the Hot Country Songs chart, where it should be.”
Billboard’s year-end music recaps represent aggregated metrics for each artist, title, label and music contributor on the weekly charts from Nov. 19, 2022, through Oct. 21, 2023. Rankings for Luminate-based recaps reflect equivalent album units, airplay, sales or streaming during the weeks that the titles appeared on a respective chart during the tracking year. Any activity registered before or after a title’s chart run isn’t considered in these rankings. That methodology detail, and the November-October time period, account for some of the difference between these lists and the calendar-year recaps that are independently compiled by Luminate.
It’s taken a decade, but for the first time, a country artist is No. 1 on Billboard’s year-end Streaming Songs Artists chart.
… and a country song is No. 1 on the year-end Streaming Songs chart.
… and the top 10s of both rankings are chock full of both country artists and songs.
Point is, 2023 was a banner year for country on the streaming charts. And that’s after 2022’s year-end Streaming Songs Artists tally featured a country artist in the top 10 for the very first time in Morgan Wallen.
Oh, right, the No. 1 artist and song of 2023. It’s Wallen.
Explore All of Billboard’s 2023 Year-End Charts
After breaking through as the first act releasing music primarily in the country genre to appear in the Streaming Songs Artists survey’s top 10 at No. 4 in 2022, Wallen leads it in 2023, while his “Last Night” crowns the songs-based list, also marking the first time a country tune ranks atop that chart; both year-end recaps began in 2013, the same year Streaming Songs became a weekly Billboard chart.
“Last Night” was the only song of Wallen’s to reach No. 1 on the weekly Streaming Songs list. But it was far and away the year’s biggest song there, reigning for 19 weeks beginning in March. Barring a return to No. 1, the song concludes its run one week short of the record for most frames atop Streaming Songs, held by Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road” featuring Billy Ray Cyrus.
It was so comparatively massive, in fact, that the next-closest songs released in 2023 in terms of overall weeks at No. 1 were Zach Bryan’s “I Remember Everything” featuring Kacey Musgraves, and Miley Cyrus’ “Flowers.” Currently, both boast four weeks apiece atop the survey.
Streaming was, as a result, a critical component of “Last Night” and its sizable run at No. 1 on the weekly multimetric Billboard Hot 100, reigning for 16 weeks.
But though “Last Night” was Wallen’s only No. 1 of the year, the weekly Streaming Songs tally was dotted with the 30-year-old’s tracks in 2023, both via his monster 2023 LP One Thing at a Time and from previous releases. In all, Wallen appears six times on the 75-song-deep year-end Streaming Songs ranking, with “Last Night” followed by “You Proof” at No. 6.
Country’s hold on Streaming Songs wasn’t limited to Wallen, either. Four of the top 10 on Streaming Songs Artists in 2023 largely released music in the country genre, while a fifth, Taylor Swift, appeared on the weekly survey with country songs a few times via her Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) re-recording. Compare that number to 2022, when six country acts made the entire 25-position Streaming Songs Artists year-end list, Wallen the only one of the group in the top 10.
Joining Wallen in the top 10 are three acts who were part of that group of six last year. Zach Bryan ranks at No. 5, followed by Luke Combs at No. 6 and Bailey Zimmerman rounding out the club at No. 9.
Bryan’s “Something in the Orange,” originally released in 2022 as part of the album American Heartbreak, soared to new heights in 2023 (it was No. 12 on the year-end 2022 Streaming Songs tally), rising to No. 3 the year-end survey. Combs’ cover of Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car” also reaches the top 10 at No. 7, giving country four of the top 10.
Give a shoutout to other genres, too. R&B was well presented by SZA, who ranks at No. 2 on the year-end artists ranking while her “Kill Bill” is the No. 2 song. It became her first No. 1 on the weekly chart (four weeks beginning in December 2022) and helps SZA to her best-ever ranks on either year-end list. Her previous best on Streaming Songs as a lead artist had been “Good Days” in 2021 (No. 29), the same year she appeared at a then-career-best No. 22 on the artists rundown.
And while Bad Bunny didn’t quite retain the dominance he enjoyed in 2022 as the No. 1 on Streaming Songs Artists (chalk that up in part to his latest album, Nadie Sabe Lo Que Va a Pasar Mañana, only having come out in October, eligible for the 2024 year-end rankings), not only did he still appear at a respectable No. 15 – Latin music was also represented in the top 10 thanks to Peso Pluma, whose meteoric rise caps off with a No. 7 placement. Concurrently, his collaboration with Eslabon Armado, “Ella Baila Sola,” ranks at No. 9 on the year-end Streaming Songs ranking.
Billboard’s year-end music recaps represent aggregated metrics for each artist, title, label and music contributor on the weekly charts from Nov. 19, 2022, through Oct. 21, 2023. Rankings for Luminate-based recaps reflect equivalent album units, airplay, sales or streaming during the weeks that the titles appeared on a respective chart during the tracking year. Any activity registered before or after a title’s chart run isn’t considered in these rankings. That methodology detail, and the November-October time period, account for some of the difference between these lists and the calendar-year recaps that are independently compiled by Luminate.