With the Christmas and New Year season behind us, we've entered into the next realm and that is albums returning to prior sales levels post-iTunes and store gift cards. With that in mind, nearly every artist here has seen drastic sales declines over the previous week, where Carrie Underwood's Cry Pretty album scored the #1 slot. This week, Dan+Shay return to #1 and dominate all the country charts thanks to the 4 week #1 hit "Speechless." That song and previous multi-week #1 "Tequila" have turned the duo into a top shelf A-list duo in all of music, not just country music. Underwood's fall is only to #2 this week with Cry Pretty sitting at nearly 401,000 pure albums sold. Kacey Musgraves' Golden Hour finds the Grammy darling with 141,100 albums sold now (all without any mainstream country radio hits). Speaking of mainstream country radio hits, at #4 is Kane Brown's recent #1 Experiment. The rising star has now sold nearly 167,000 albums while Luke Combs' This One's For You (Too) rounds out the singer's run on the radio charts with "Beautiful Crazy," the final single from a successful debut album.
The Top 10 is rounded out by Eric Church's Desperate Man (with 179,000 sold to date), Chris Stapletons timeless Traveller with 2,425 million plus fans now owning the record while Josh Turner's I Serve A Savior is finding audiences and has sold nearly 61,000 copies, making it one of the Christian music market's best-selling new albums of the year. John Prine's Tree Of Forgiveness sits at #9 with sales of nearly 134,000 while Brett Young's Ticket To L.A. sits at #10 with sales of 40,600 so far.
There are many notables including Upchurch's River Rat album with nearly 10k sold, which is not bad for an indie act that doesn't make anything mainstream yet constantly releases new material to audiences (he's sold more than some top country albums this year with cumulative sales closer to 100,000 than 50,000). Dolly Parton's Dumplin' soundtrack has sold over 18k while Mitchell Tenpenny's Telling All My Secrets has scanned nearly 18,000 copies and has a streaming figure of around 40,000 units in total consumption so far. Ashley McBryde's Girl Going Nowhere has sold over 31,000 copies while Martina McBride, Dailey & Vincent and Vince Gill have the only Christmas projects on this week's rundown.
| Place | Artist | Album | Week | Total Scans |
| 1 | Dan + Shay | Dan + Shay | 5,100 | 91,900 |
| 2 | Carrie Underwood | Cry Pretty | 4,700 | 400,800 |
| 3 | Kacey Musgraves | Golden Hour | 4,200 | 141,100 |
| 4 | Kane Brown | Experiment | 3,900 | 166,700 |
| 5 | Luke Combs | This One's For You (Too) | 3,600 | 399,000 |
| 6 | Eric Church | Desperate Man | 3,400 | 179,000 |
| 7 | Chris Stapleton | Traveller | 3,300 | 2,425,400 |
| 8 | Josh Turner | I Serve A Savior | 3,200 | 60,900 |
| 9 | John Prine | Tree of Forgiveness | 2,800 | 133,700 |
| 10 | Brett Young | Ticket To L.A. | 2,500 | 40,600 |
| 11 | Upchurch | River Rat | 2,300 | 9,200 |
| 12 | Chris Stapleton | From A Room: Vol 2. | 2,200 | 480,200 |
| 13 | Thomas Rhett | Life Changes | 2,100 | 314,400 |
| 14 | Pistol Annies | Interstate Gospel | 2,100 | 60,100 |
| 15 | Dolly Parton | Dumplin' Original Soundtrack | 1,800 | 18,000 |
| -- | Kane Brown | Kane Brown | 1,800 | 496,900 |
| -- | Mitchell Tenpenny | Telling All My Secrets | 1,600 | 17,800 |
| -- | Jason Aldean | Rearview Town | 1,500 | 462,700 |
| -- | Kenny Chesney | Songs For The Saints | 1,500 | 139,100 |
| -- | Kelsea Ballerini | Unapologetically | 1,400 | 129,900 |
| -- | Brett Young | Brett Young | 1,300 | 253,400 |
| -- | Dierks Bentley | The Mountain | 1,300 | 181,300 |
| -- | Ashley McBryde | Girl Going Nowhere | 1,200 | 31,300 |
| -- | Keith Urban | Grafitti U | 1,200 | 272,900 |
| -- | Rosanne Cash | She Remembers Everything | 1,100 | 15,300 |
| -- | Brothers Osborne | Port Saint Joe | 1,100 | 75,000 |
| -- | Luke Bryan | What Makes You Country | 1,100 | 351,500 |
| -- | Martina McBride | It's The Holiday Season | 1,100 | 15,100 |
| -- | Tyler Childers | Purgatory | 1,000 | 54,800 |
| -- | Midland | On The Rocks | 900 | 107,200 |
| -- | Caroline Jones | Bare Feet | 900 | 38,600 |
| -- | Cole Swindell | All Of It | 700 | 90,600 |
| -- | Scotty McCreery | Seasons Change | 700 | 90,800 |
| -- | Dailey & Vincent | Sounds Of Christmas | 600 | 11,900 |
| -- | Chris Young | Losing Sleep | 500 | 114,200 |
| -- | Jon Pardi | California Sunrise | 500 | 260,300 |
| Cody Jinks | Lifers | 500 | 41,900 | |
| -- | Joey + Rory | The Singer And The Song: Best | 500 | 14,600 |
| -- | Home Free | Timeless | 500 | 49,900 |
| -- | Toby Keith | Should've Been A Cowboy (25th) | 400 | 4,200 |
| -- | Jimmie Allen | Mercury Lane | 400 | 10,000 |
| -- | Maren Morris | Hero | 400 | 305,800 |
| -- | Old Dominion | Happy Endings | 400 | 105,200 |
| -- | Willie Nelson | Last Man Standing | 400 | 79,600 |
| -- | Jill Martin | The Locals - EP | 400 | 400 |
| -- | Loretta Lynn | Wouldn't It Be Great | 400 | 22,100 |
| -- | Vince Gill | Christmas Collection | 300 | 2,500 |
| -- | Kip Moore | Slowheart | 300 | 56,200 |
| -- | Morgan Wallen | If I Know Me | 300 | 12,900 |
| -- | Margo Price | All American MAde | 300 | 32,100 |
| -- | Colter Wall | Songs Of The Plains | 200 | 9,900 |
| -- | Darius Rucker | When Was The Last Time | 200 | 121,200 |
| -- | Wheeler Walker Jr | WWIII | 200 | 8,100 |
| -- | Chris Janson | Everybody | 200 | 46,600 |
Courtney
psome of those numbers aren't bad considering the year over year sales decreases particularly Jason Aldean's Carrie Underwood's and Keith Urban's both Rearview Town and Cry Pretty are R.I.A.A. certified Gold for shipment of 500,000 copies each though neither has sold 500,000 to the public yet Rearview town at 466,000 and Cry Pretty at 405,000 since their April and September 2018 releases respectively granted subsequent albums usually sell faster than a debut because an artist is established Platinum certs were created in the early 1970's Multi Platinum in October 1984 for example by October 30th 1984 Michael Jackson's Thriller was certified 20 x platinum in The US 23 months after it's release or Fleetwood Mac's Rumours was certified 12 x platinum October 22nd 1984 and the diamond Award was launched in 1999 celebrating 10 million copies sold or more of either an album or Single thus far 92 albums and around 30 singles are certified diamond and several albums including Taylor Swift's 1989 Christina Aguilera's self titled debut which turns 20 this summer Journey's Escape Faith Hill's Breathe Eagles Hell Freezes Over etc are on the cusp of being certified diamond Journey's Escape was last certified in November 1994 at 9 x platinum some albums which are already diamond also need updates such as Adele's 21 should be 15 x platinum Journey's Greatest Hits should be at minimum 16 x platinum Beatles The White Album should be 20 x platinum Beatles 1 and Abbey Road should each be at minimum 13 x platinum Whitney Houston's 1987 sophomore album Whitney should be diamond as should Mariah Carey's Self Titled 1990 debut there are currently 12 albums certified 20 x platinum or higher by the RIAA 10 of which are pop/rock albums and two are country those being Garth Brooks Double Live and Shania Twains Come On Over Shania was the first female artist to earn 3 diamond albums Garth has the most with 7 at the moment the best selling soundtrack in US history is Whitney Houston & Various Artists the Bodyguard certified 18 x platinum in November 2017 for the 25th anniversary of release of the album and film