"Wild at Heart" is a song written by

Stephanie Bentley Stephanie Kay Bentley (born April 29, 1963) is an American country music artist. She made her debut in 1996 as a duet partner on Ty Herndon's single "Heart Half Empty", which peaked at No. 21 on the ''Billboard'' Hot Country Singles & Track ...

Josh Kear Josh Kear is a Nashville-based songwriter signed to Sony/ATV Music Publishing. In 2007, he cowrote Carrie Underwood’s hit "Before He Cheats" with Chris Tompkins. The song spent five weeks at the top of the charts. His song "Drinking Class", pe ...

and

Matt Serletic Matthew Michael Serletic II (born 1970 or 1971) is an American record producer, songwriter, and music executive. Career As a teenager, Serletic joined a band with members of Collective Soul, a group for which he would later produce. Serletic h ...

, and recorded 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, ...

group

Gloriana ''Gloriana'', Op. 53, is an opera in three acts by Benjamin Britten to an English libretto by William Plomer, based on Lytton Strachey's 1928 ''Elizabeth and Essex: A Tragic History''. The first performance was presented at the Royal Opera Hous ...

. In February 2009, the song was released as the group's debut single, and was available as a digital download on May 8, 2009. It served as the lead-off single to Gloriana's self-titled debut album that was released August 4, 2009.

Critical reception

Roughstock critic Matt Bjorke spoke positively of the song. He compared Gloriana to

Little Big Town Little Big Town is an American country music vocal group from Homewood, Alabama. Founded in 1998, the group has comprised the same four members since its founding: Karen Fairchild, Kimberly Schlapman (née Roads), Phillip Sweet, and Jimi Westbro ...

, another country group with four part harmonies and said, "It’s easy to like songs like this, even if the lyrics don’t really say too much in the way of insightful messages, we all need and like to hear feel-good songs every once in a while." The song became the best-selling country music debut single in 2009. It was

certified gold Music recording certification is a system of certifying that a music recording has shipped, sold, or streamed a certain number of units. The threshold quantity varies by type (such as album, single, music video) and by nation or territory (see ...

by the

Recording Industry Association of America 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 August 18, 2010, for digital sales of 500,000 copies.

Music video

A music video directed by Elliott Lester was released for the song on February 19, 2009. In the video, the group is shown driving around town at night with neon signs in the background as well as performing with their instruments inside a house. After the song's second chorus, people enter the house and begin clapping and dancing to the music while Gloriana finishes the song. "Wild at Heart" debuted at No. 19 on CMT's "Top 20 Countdown" for the week of May 1, 2009; it has since reached #10. The video was nominated for ''USA Weekend Breakthrough Video of the Year'' and ''Group Video of the Year'' at the 2009

CMT Music Awards The CMT Music Awards is a fan-voted awards show for country music videos and television performances. The awards ceremony is held every year in Nashville, Tennessee, and broadcast live on the CMT (Country Music Television) channel. Voting takes p ...

Charts and certifications

"Wild at Heart" debuted at No. 54 on the U.S. ''Billboard''

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 in February 2009. It reached No. 16 on the chart dated for July 25, 2009 and fell from the chart the next week, but re-entered at No. 16 on the week of August 1, and reached a new peak of No. 15 the next week, before falling off yet again this time for good.

Chart performance

Year-end charts

Certifications

References

{{Gloriana Gloriana (band) songs 2009 debut singles 2009 songs Songs written by Stephanie Bentley Songs written by Matt Serletic Songs written by Josh Kear Song recordings produced by Matt Serletic Warner Records singles Reprise Records singles