''Wildflower'' is the debut studio album by season ten ''

American Idol ''American Idol'' is an American singing competition television series created by Simon Fuller, produced by Fremantle North America and 19 Entertainment, and distributed by Fremantle North America. It aired on Fox from June 11, 2002, to Ap ...

'' runner-up

Lauren Alaina Lauren Alaina Kristine Suddeth (born November 8, 1994) is an American singer and songwriter from Rossville, Georgia. She was the runner-up on the tenth season of ''American Idol.'' Her debut studio album, ''Wildflower,'' was released on October ...

. The album was released by

Mercury 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 N ...

. on October 11, 2011 in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. The album's first single, " Like My Mother Does", reached the Top 40 on the '' 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. ''Wildflower'' debuted at number five on the US ''Billboard'' 200 chart, making Alaina the youngest female artist to debut that high since LeAnn Rimes' debut album, ''

Blue Blue is one of the three primary colours in the RYB colour model (traditional colour theory), as well as in the RGB (additive) colour model. It lies between violet and cyan on the spectrum of visible light. The eye perceives blue when obs ...

'', fifteen years prior.

Reception

''Wildflower'' received positive reviews from music critics. At

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, 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 72, based on 4 reviews, which indicates "generally favorable reviews".

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 ...

writer Stephen Thomas Erlewine gave the album 3 stars out of 5 and wrote: "Byron Gallimore, who previously produced Sugarland and

Faith Hill Audrey Faith McGraw (; born September 21, 1967), known professionally as Faith Hill, is an American singer and actress. She is one of the most successful country music artists of all time, having sold more than 40 million albums worldwide. Hill' ...

, gives Wildflower an appealing gloss that helps disguise the ordinariness of the material along with any of Alaina's shortcomings, and that slickness serves Wildflower well, making it a much more enjoyable piece of product than McCreery's '' Clear as Day''". ''

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'' gave a very positive review to the album and said: "It works, not only because Ms. Alaina has a big voice, but also because she doesn't portray herself as an aw-shucks beginner. She's skipped that step, and rightly so". Melissa Maerz of ''

Entertainment Weekly ''Entertainment Weekly'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''EW'') is an American digital-only entertainment magazine based in New York City, published by Dotdash Meredith, that covers film, television, music, Broadway theatre, books, and popular cul ...

'' was also positive on the album and gave it a "B" and said: "On Wildflower, she captures the restless spirit of small-town girls who get grounded for French-kissing the boy next door". Jessica Nicholson of ''

Country Weekly ''Nash Country Weekly'' was an American lifestyle weekly magazine about country artists and their music. It was in circulation between April 1994 and May 2016. The publisher, Cumulus Media, now maintains the site ''Nash Country Daily''. Overview ...

'' gave the album 3 and half stars out of 5 and noted: "Despite the album's title, she plays it safe rather than wild".

Track listing

Personnel

- lead vocals * Charlie Bisharat - fiddle * Perry Coleman - background vocals *

Dan Dugmore Dan Dugmore is an American session musician known primarily for playing the pedal steel guitar Born in 1949, Dugmore was raised in Pasadena, California. Influenced by the Flying Burrito Brothers, he learned to play steel guitar after Flying Bur ...

- dobro, steel guitar * Stuart Duncan - fiddle,

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 ...

Shannon Forrest Shannon Forrest (born August 22, 1973 in Easley, South Carolina) is an American drummer and percussionist known primarily for his session work. As a session drummer, he has contributed to the work of many well-known artists, and he is also a pr ...

- drums,

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Exc ...

Larry Franklin The Lawrence Franklin espionage scandal involved Lawrence Franklin passing classified documents regarding United States policy towards Iran to Israel. Franklin, a former United States Department of Defense employee, pleaded guilty to several espi ...

- fiddle * Paul Franklin - steel guitar *

Byron Gallimore Byron Gallimore (born in Puryear, Tennessee) is an American record producer known for more than two decades of work in the field of country music. He has worked with artists Tim McGraw, Faith Hill, Sugarland, Lee Ann Womack, and Jo Dee Messina. ...

electric guitar An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar (however combinations of the two - a semi-acoustic guitar and an electric acoustic gui ...

keyboards Keyboard may refer to: Text input * Keyboard, part of a typewriter * Computer keyboard ** Keyboard layout, the software control of computer keyboards and their mapping ** Keyboard technology, computer keyboard hardware and firmware Music * Musi ...

* Lisa Gregg - background vocals * Tania Hancheroff - background vocals * Troy Lancaster - acoustic guitar, electric guitar * Pat McGrath - banjo, acoustic guitar,

resonator guitar A resonator guitar or resophonic guitar is an acoustic guitar that produces sound by conducting string vibrations through the bridge to one or more spun metal cones (resonators), instead of to the guitar's sounding board (top). Resonator guit ...

, mandolin * Jerry McPherson - electric guitar * Kenny LeMasters - steel guitar *

Brent Mason Brent Mason (born July 13, 1959) is an American, Nashville, Tennessee-based recording studio guitarist and songwriter, performing primarily country music. Guitar World Magazine listed him as one of the "Top Ten Session Guitarists of All Time". ...

- electric guitar *

Jamie Muhoberac Benjamin Edward "Jamie" Muhoberac is an American session keyboardist with numerous credits. He is best known for his work with Seal and Was (Not Was). Biography Muhoberac has worked with acts including The All-American Rejects, Fleetwood Mac, B ...

- keyboards *

Steve Nathan Steven Jay Nathan is an American keyboardist. He is known for his session work in Muscle Shoals and Nashville studios. Biography Nathan was born and raised in Buffalo, New York. In 1977, Nathan moved to Muscle Shoals, Alabama. After touring w ...

- keyboards, organ,

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keybo ...

* Jeannette Olsson - background vocals * Michael Thompson - electric guitar *

Lonnie Wilson Lonnie Wilson is an American drummer, songwriter, and record producer, known primarily for his work in country music. Born in Monroe, Louisiana, Wilson was originally the lead singer of the band Bandana, which charted ten singles on the Hot Co ...

- drums, drum loops, percussion *

Glenn Worf Glenn Worf is an American bassist known mainly for his work as a session musician. He has recorded with many major country music acts and also tours with Mark Knopfler. Early life and education Worf was born in Dayton, Ohio, and grew up in Mad ...

bass guitar The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and ...

* Craig Young - bass guitar * Chris "Tek" O'Ryan - sound engineer

Chart performance

The album debuted at No. 5 on the ''Billboard'' 200 with 69,000 copies sold. It has sold 303,000 copies in the United States as of January 2013.

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

References

External links

{{Authority control 2011 debut albums Lauren Alaina albums Mercury Nashville albums 19 Recordings albums Interscope Records albums Interscope Geffen A&M Records albums