''Montevallo'' is the debut studio album by American
country music
Country (also called country and western) is a genre of popular music that originated in the Southern and Southwestern United States in the early 1920s. It primarily derives from blues, church music such as Southern gospel and spirituals, ...
singer
Sam Hunt
Sam Lowry Hunt (born December 8, 1984) is an American singer and songwriter. Born in Cedartown, Georgia, Hunt played football in his high school and college years and once attempted to pursue a professional sports career before signing with MCA ...
. It was released on October 27, 2014, by
MCA Nashville
Universal Music Group Nashville is Universal Music Group's country music subsidiary. Some of the labels in this group include MCA Nashville Records, Mercury Nashville Records, Lost Highway Records, Capitol Records Nashville and EMI Records Nashv ...
. Hunt co-wrote all 10 tracks on the album. The album was produced by
Zach Crowell
Zach Crowell is a songwriter and record producer, who was born and raised in Nashville, Tennessee. Crowell is involved in a joint publishing agreement with Round Hill Music and Taperoom Music.
In 2012, he co-wrote and produced the song "Confe$$io ...
and
Shane McAnally
Shane McAnally (born October 12, 1974) is an American country music singer, songwriter, and record producer. Originally a solo artist for Curb Records in 1999, McAnally charted three singles on Hot Country Songs, including the No. 31 " Are Y ...
. "
Cop Car" was previously recorded by
Keith Urban
Keith Lionel Urban (born 26 October 1967) is an Australian-American musician, singer, guitarist and songwriter known for his work in country music. Recognized with four Grammy Awards, Urban also received fifteen Academy of Country Music Award ...
on his eighth studio album ''
Fuse
Fuse or FUSE may refer to:
Devices
* Fuse (electrical), a device used in electrical systems to protect against excessive current
** Fuse (automotive), a class of fuses for vehicles
* Fuse (hydraulic), a device used in hydraulic systems to protect ...
'', who released it as a single in January 2014.
In 2015, ''Montevallo'' was nominated for
Best Country Album
The Grammy Award for Best Country Album is an award presented at the Grammy Awards, a ceremony that was established in 1958 and originally called the Gramophone Awards, to recording artists for quality albums in the country music genre. Honors ...
at the
58th Annual Grammy Awards
The 58th Annual Grammy Awards was held on February 15, 2016, at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. The ceremony recognizes the best recordings, compositions and artists of the eligibility year, which was from October 1, 2014, to September 30, 20 ...
. It won the 2016
American Country Countdown Awards
The American Country Countdown Awards were a country music award presentation that was held in 2014 and 2016. Produced by Dick Clark Productions and co-branded with the syndicated radio show ''American Country Countdown'', it featured awards base ...
for Digital Album of the Year.
Background
The album's name is a nod to the town of
Montevallo, Alabama
Montevallo is a city in Shelby County, Alabama, United States. A college town, it is the home of the University of Montevallo, a public liberal arts university with approximately 3,000 students. As of the 2020 census, the population of the city o ...
, the hometown of Hunt's wife, Hannah Lee Fowler. He played football for the
UAB Blazers
The UAB Blazers are the varsity intercollegiate athletic programs that represent the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). The school is one of the fourteen member institutions of Conference USA (C-USA) and participates in Division I of th ...
and met Hannah during his time in
Birmingham
Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the West ...
. Hunt moved to Nashville in 2008 but continued to date his girlfriend on and off. Fowler and Hunt married in Georgia in 2017. Many of the songs on the album are inspired by their relationship challenges.
Singles
"
Leave the Night On
"Leave the Night On" is a song co-written and recorded by American country music singer Sam Hunt. It was released to country radio, by MCA Nashville on June 16, 2014 as the lead single from his debut studio album '' Montevallo'' (2014). The song wa ...
" was released as the lead single from the album on June 16, 2014. The song peaked at number one on both
Hot Country Songs
Hot Country Songs is a chart published weekly by ''Billboard'' magazine in the United States.
This 50-position chart lists the most popular country music songs, calculated weekly by collecting airplay data from Nielsen BDS along with digital sal ...
chart and
Country Airplay
Country Airplay is a chart published weekly by ''Billboard'' magazine in the United States since January 20, 1990.
This chart lists the 60 most-listened-to records played on 150 mainstream country radio stations across the country as monitored ...
chart, as well as peaking at number 30 on the US
''Billboard'' Hot 100. It has been certified Platinum by the
RIAA
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...
. As of February 2015, it has sold 1,002,000 copies in the US.
"
Take Your Time" was released as the second single from the album on November 24, 2014. The song became Hunt's most successful single up to that time, crossing over to pop and adult contemporary formats, peaking at number 20 on the US ''Billboard'' Hot 100, as well as topping both Hot Country Songs chart and Country Airplay chart. It topped the year-end charts on the Hot Country Songs chart in 2015. It has been certified 2× Platinum by the RIAA. As of March 2016, it has sold 2,001,000 copies in the US.
"
House Party
A house party is a type of party where people gather at the residence of the party's host.
Organization
A house party might be organized several months or just a few hours in advance. News of a party may be spread by personal invitations, ...
" was released as the third single from the album on June 1, 2015. Like the previous singles, "House Party" also reached number one on both Hot Country Songs chart and Country Airplay chart. It peaked at number 26 on the US ''Billboard'' Hot 100. The song has been certified Platinum by the RIAA. As of February 2016, it has sold 1,121,000 copies in the US.
"
Break Up in a Small Town" was released as the fourth single from the album on September 21, 2015. It peaked at number 29 on the US ''Billboard'' Hot 100 and became Hunt's first single to miss the top spot on the Hot Country Songs chart and the Country Airplay chart, peaking at number two on both charts. It has been certified Platinum by the RIAA. As of March 2016, it has sold 1,230,000 copies in the US.
"
Make You Miss Me
"Make You Miss Me" is a song co-written and recorded by American country music singer Sam Hunt. It was released to country radio, by MCA Nashville on March 7, 2016 as the fifth single from his debut studio album '' Montevallo'' (2014). The song is ...
" was released as the fifth single from the album on March 7, 2016. It topped the Country Airplay chart, making Hunt the first solo male artist to land four number ones on the Country Airplay chart from a debut studio album. It peaked at number two on the Hot Country Songs chart and at number 45 on the US ''Billboard'' Hot 100. As of September 2016, it has sold 607,000 copies in the US.
Critical reception
Upon release, ''Montevallo'' received positive reviews from contemporary music critics, and drew heavy attention to Hunt's incorporation of hip hop, R&B, and pop music elements into the project. At ''Album of the Year'', which assigns a
normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an
average
In ordinary language, an average is a single number taken as representative of a list of numbers, usually the sum of the numbers divided by how many numbers are in the list (the arithmetic mean). For example, the average of the numbers 2, 3, 4, 7, ...
score of 70 based on 3 reviews. Elias Leight from ''
Billboard
A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...
'' provided a favorable review, describing "eighty percent of this album could compete easily in the top 40", and stated the album "comes from a guy with a hit on the country charts, but has little to identify it as country."
Stephen Thomas Erlewine
Stephen Thomas Erlewine (; born June 18, 1973) is an American music critic and senior editor for the online music database AllMusic. He is the author of many artist biographies and record reviews for AllMusic, as well as a freelance writer, occ ...
of
AllMusic
AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...
rated the album 3.5 out of 5, saying that "Hunt is unabashedly a modern guy and his taste for busy electronic arrangements and facility with fleet-footed rhythms distinguish him from the pack of modern country bros...What grounds the album is his clean, commercial songwriting, heavy on hooks but also sturdily constructed. Ultimately, Hunt's ability to fuse his classical construction with modern flair and pass it off as no big thing is what makes his debut something more than just another album from the bro next door."
Writing for ''
Vice
A vice is a practice, behaviour, or habit generally considered immoral, sinful, criminal, rude, taboo, depraved, degrading, deviant or perverted in the associated society. In more minor usage, vice can refer to a fault, a negative character tra ...
'',
Robert Christgau
Robert Thomas Christgau ( ; born April 18, 1942) is an American music journalist and essayist. Among the most well-known and influential music critics, he began his career in the late 1960s as one of the earliest professional rock critics and ...
cited "Take Your Time" and "Cop Car" as highlights and summarized the album with the following: "Popmeister from a small town hooks women for a living, defies cops for show".
Commercial performance
The album debuted on the US
''Billboard'' 200 at number three and on the
Top Country Albums
Top Country Albums is a chart published weekly by '' Billboard'' magazine in the United States. The 50-position chart lists the most popular country music albums in the country, calculated weekly by Broadcast Data Systems based on physical sales a ...
chart at number one, with 70,000 sold for the week. The lead single from the album, "
Leave the Night On
"Leave the Night On" is a song co-written and recorded by American country music singer Sam Hunt. It was released to country radio, by MCA Nashville on June 16, 2014 as the lead single from his debut studio album '' Montevallo'' (2014). The song wa ...
" also reached number one at the same time on the
Hot Country Songs
Hot Country Songs is a chart published weekly by ''Billboard'' magazine in the United States.
This 50-position chart lists the most popular country music songs, calculated weekly by collecting airplay data from Nielsen BDS along with digital sal ...
and
Country Airplay
Country Airplay is a chart published weekly by ''Billboard'' magazine in the United States since January 20, 1990.
This chart lists the 60 most-listened-to records played on 150 mainstream country radio stations across the country as monitored ...
charts, which made Sam Hunt the first country artist in 22 years to reach the top of three country charts simultaneously since
Billy Ray Cyrus
Billy Ray Cyrus (born August 25, 1961) is an American country singer and actor. He has released 16 studio albums and 53 singles since 1992, and is known for his hit single "Achy Breaky Heart", which topped the U.S. Hot Country Songs chart and ...
.
''Montevallo'' topped the Top Country Albums chart for nine non-consecutive weeks. The album was certified Gold by the
RIAA
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...
on April 14, 2015, and 2× Platinum on February 1, 2016. The album reached over a million in sales in the US by February 2016.
As of April 2017, the album has sold 1,292,400 copies in the US.
For the year-end charts of 2015, ''Montevallo'' was ranked at number one on the Top Country Albums chart and at number 11 on the US ''Billboard'' 200.
Track listing
Personnel
Mix engineers
* Zach Crowell – "House Party", "Cop Car", "Single for the Summer", "Make You Miss Me", "Speakers"
* Billy Decker – "Leave the Night On", "Raised on It"
* Ryan Gore – "Take Your Time"
* Reid Shippen – "Break Up in a Small Town", "Ex to See"
Musicians
* Josh Burkett – electric guitar
* Tyrone Carreker – electric guitar, background vocals
*
Joshua Sales – drums
*
Chad Cromwell
Chad Cromwell (born June 14, 1957) is an American rock drummer whose music career has spanned more than 30 years. He is the founding member of a band called Fortunate Sons, which released a self-titled album in 2004.
Cromwell has worked with m ...
– drums
*
Zach Crowell
Zach Crowell is a songwriter and record producer, who was born and raised in Nashville, Tennessee. Crowell is involved in a joint publishing agreement with Round Hill Music and Taperoom Music.
In 2012, he co-wrote and produced the song "Confe$$io ...
– programming, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, bass guitar, ganjo, piano, keyboards, background vocals
* David Davidson – violin, viola
* Mike Durham – electric guitar
*
Fred Eltringham
The Wallflowers is an American rock solo project of American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Jakob Dylan. The Wallflowers were originally a roots rock band formed in Los Angeles in 1989 by Dylan and guitarist Tobi Miller. The band ...
– drums
* Ian Fitchuk – piano, drums
* Jerry Flowers – bass guitar, acoustic guitar, ganjo
*
Mickey Guyton
Mickey Guyton (; born Candace Mycale Guyton; June 17, 1983) is an American country music artist. Raised in Texas, Guyton was exposed to various types of music at a young age, and her material subsequently incorporates elements of contemporary cou ...
– background vocals
*
Sam Hunt
Sam Lowry Hunt (born December 8, 1984) is an American singer and songwriter. Born in Cedartown, Georgia, Hunt played football in his high school and college years and once attempted to pursue a professional sports career before signing with MCA ...
– lead vocals, acoustic guitar,
ganjo, piano
*
Hillary Lindsey
Hillary Lee Lindsey is an American singer-songwriter. She has written songs with or for a number of artists including Michelle Branch, Faith Hill, Martina McBride, Shakira, Lady A, Gary Allan, Sara Evans, Carrie Underwood, Kellie Pickler, Bon ...
– background vocals
*
Shane McAnally
Shane McAnally (born October 12, 1974) is an American country music singer, songwriter, and record producer. Originally a solo artist for Curb Records in 1999, McAnally charted three singles on Hot Country Songs, including the No. 31 " Are Y ...
– background vocals
*
Chris McHugh
Chris McHugh (born 1964) is an American musician. He began his career as the drummer of Christian rock band White Heart from 1986 to 1989. He also worked in the recording of several of their later albums.
Chris McHugh is on the Nashville "A" li ...
– drums
* Rob McNelly – electric guitar
* Devin Malone – electric guitar, acoustic guitar,
mandolin
A mandolin ( it, mandolino ; literally "small mandola") is a stringed musical instrument in the lute family and is generally plucked with a pick. It most commonly has four courses of doubled strings tuned in unison, thus giving a total of 8 ...
,
pedal steel guitar
The pedal steel guitar is a Console steel guitar, console-type of steel guitar with pedals and knee levers that change the pitch of certain strings to enable playing more varied and complex music than any previous steel guitar design. Like all s ...
,
dobro
Dobro is an American brand of resonator guitars, currently owned by Gibson and manufactured by its subsidiary Epiphone. The term "dobro" is also used as a generic term for any wood-bodied, single-cone resonator guitar.
The Dobro was originally ...
*
Josh Osborne
Josh Osborne (born c. 1980) is an American songwriter with several number-one singles to his credit.
Early life
Josh Osborne was born in Pike County, Kentucky, and raised in Virgie, Kentucky. Osborne grew up on US 23, renamed Country Music High ...
– background vocals
* Scotty Sanders – pedal steel guitar
*
Jimmie Lee Sloas
Jimmie Lee Sloas is an American session musician, producer, and songwriter, who plays bass guitar.
History
Jimmie Lee Sloas, born in Ashland, Kentucky, grew up in Fairborn, Ohio and Isonville, Kentucky. His father, Dave, was a member of the p ...
– bass guitar
* Matt Stanfield – piano, keyboards,
organ
*
Ilya Toshinsky
Bering Strait was a Russian country music band, whose style was sometimes called "redgrass". In 2003, the band was nominated for a Grammy Award and appeared on the TV show ''60 Minutes''. The group disbanded in 2006. The lineup on their first alb ...
– acoustic guitar, ganjo, mandolin
Production
* Brad Belanger – cover photo
* Kenley Flynn – production coordination
* Andrew Mendelson – mastering engineer
* Karen Naff – design
* Stephanie Wright – A&R
Charts
Weekly charts
Year-end charts
Decade-end charts
Certifications
References
{{Authority control
2014 debut albums
Sam Hunt albums
MCA Records albums
Albums produced by Shane McAnally
Albums produced by Zach Crowell