Miranda Lambert Joins Alan Jackson & Lady A in Hot Country Albums Top 5

In a week that saw virtually every album that wasn’t a new release drop over 30% in sales numbers over last week, one country artist bucked that trend and that artist isn’t Lady Antebellum or Taylor Swift.  It was Miranda Lambert as her third album jumped up the Nielsen SoundScan Hot 200 Albums chart to get herself back inside the Top 30 and giving her a Top 5 country album again.   She passed Carrie Underwood, Easton Corbin, Blake Shelton Jason Aldean, Gary Allan, Gretchen Wilson and Josh Turner this week on the Hot Country Albums chart.

Lady Antebellum continues to have the best-selling country album in the country and has remained inside the Top 5 of the album sales chart each of the eleven weeks the album has been on the charts.  It passed the 1.7 million sold this week.  Alan Jackson retained his second place on the Hot Country Albums sales chart and is nearing 100k sold for Freight Train as a new single, “Hard Hat & A Hammer” was sent out to radio.  Zac Brown Band are the only country band to score 4 #1 singles from their debut album The Foundation and they’re working on getting “Free” up the charts as well, to tie Rodney Crowell and Carrie Underwood’s record for 5 #1 singles off of one album. Taylor Swift rounds out the Top 5 on this chart with Fearless moving nearly another 15,000 copies. 

Note: Click on any album title in the chart to read the Roughstock review!

Carrie Underwood’s Play On may have slipped out of the Top 5 of the Hot country Albums but it still sold over 11,000 copies last week.  Easton Corbin recently celebrated his debut #1 single, right as “Roll With It” starts its ascent up the charts.  The album has now moved 116,000 copies as the young traditionalist looks to build his career.  Peter Wolf’s first alternative country record, Midnight Souvenirs debuts at #7 on the Hot Country Albums chart this week as it moved over 9,000 copies for the former front man of J. Giles Band.  Blake Shelton’s Hillbilly Bone and Gary Allan’s Get Off On The Pain round out the Top 10.

Jason Aldean falls out of the Top 10 as Wide Open sits at 11, right ahead of the debut record from Lady Antebellum.   Lady Antebellum has now moved over 1.6 million copies.  Gretchen Wilson’s I Got Your Country Right Here moved to the 13th place of the Hot Country Charts, ahead of Josh Turner ‘s solid Haywire and the Crazy Heart soundtrack.   

Luke Bryan’s Doin’ My Thing continues to move closer to the Gold plateau, as it nears 300,000 albums sold after just two singles on the charts.  Danny Gokey’s best days may be behind him on the charts as his labum drops to 90th place on Nielsen SondScan’s Hot 200 chart this week.  But it still moved over 125,000 copies-scanned. Reba’s Keep On Loving You is the only other album on the chart, country or otherwise, that scored sales increases this week (after Miranda’s Revolutionary jump).  Keith Urban may be succumbing to gravity as Defying Gravity tumbles a bit on the charts, but it’s still got an outside shot at Platinum over time.  Rascal Flatts round out the interesting section of this week’s chart with Unstoppable almost at the 1.2 million-scanned mark, thanks to their latest hit

Next week we will see the arrival of the debut album from Laura Bell Bundy.  Will she Achin or Shakin with the sales numbers? Check back here to find out how she and all your favorites did.  

Note: If you're favorite isn't listed here and is on next week's Nielsen SoundScan Hot 200 chart, we may be able to let you know then how the albums are doing.  Just leave a comment to let us know and we'll try to get the info to you!