The 23rd edition of the CC50 is in the books and yet another big success, with the run of over half a million votes cast stretching to three of the last four months now. Unfortunately for many of the top dogs in the rankings, it was less of a success, with the top 5 dropping an average of 1.5% points of interest, a surprisingly big slide for a month where overall listener sentiment was overwhelmingly positive and more interested in the average CC50 artist than any month since last July. Their loss was the gain of the next tier of artists, as artists in the 50-60% Interest range had a very successful month through a combination of successful music releases, no new music from the top five artists, and some big brand fatigue. Langley, Childers, McCollum, and Westbrook all achieved 2.5%+ Interest increases, an impressive achievement for the cohort jockeying for position at the bottom of the Top 10. Further down, Vincent Mason made a very successful return to the CC50 after a brief hiatus, and Gavin Adcock continues to be hotter than the Georgia asphalt, leapfrogging 10 spots in the rankings. Below is the full data table:
Biggest Risers
Remarkably, July saw not one, not two, but three repeats from last month in the Biggest Risers category. Adcock, Langley, and Childers were able to build on their recent momentum, proving their recent uptick wasn’t just an anomaly. Childers may run into some headwinds based on early audience reactions to Snipe Hunter, but generally speaking, any new music is good new music, especially for artists like Childers. Meanwhile, Adcock has turned the run-up to the August release of Own Worst Enemy into an impressive hype train, his last few months being arguably the hottest streak this year after Zach Top’s dizzying climb at the start of the year.
Biggest Fallers
We briefly mentioned it earlier, but July was not a good month for the who’s who of the CC50, as voters flocked to the artists sitting just behind them in the rankings. Even the normally untouchable Zach Top shed nearly 2 points of interest, one of his worst months since joining the CC50 and earning him a spot on the list of Biggest Fallers. Combs and Aldean have suffered from a lack of output recently, and while Combs changed that with “Back in the Saddle”, the underwhelming writing and delivery make it feel like an uninspired remix of his much better “Doin’ This”.
Interestingly enough, for anyone at home wondering, the top 5 artists in our CC50 rankings dropping a collective 7.5% points of interest this month marked the second worst month ever for the top 5 artists, the worst being in March of this year, when they shed just over 9 points, led by Wallen’s 6.5 point drop and Combs and Green having poor Marchs (Marches? I’ve never thought about the plural for March, we’ll see if our beloved editor fixes this, but for now we are sticking with Marchs) as well. I would say that list of names sounds familiar, except that Wallen is currently on the outside looking up at the Top 5 after I’m the Problem failed to resonate with CC50 listeners. If you had told me at the start of the year that we would have a July Top 5 with neither Wallen nor ZB, I would have laughed, but here we are. Life comes at you fast.
Quick Hits
- It has been one month since Parker McCollum released his self-titled album, and it already seems like a big success. Popular with both listeners and critics, a difficult feat, “Parker McCollum” feels like a return to his younger, rawer albums, but with better production. Right from the get-go with “My Blue” all the way to “My Own Worst Enemy “, the album feels deeply personal and engagingly specific in its themes and lyrics. The CC50 voters agreed, giving him a 3.5% Interest bump.
- We’re only one month into our Noah Kahan demotion watch, but my previous prediction of 4 months left on the CC50 suddenly looks optimistic (or pessimistic, depending on your perspective). July saw him tumble another percentage point and three spots in the rankings, down to 24.2% and #44. My statistical analysis predicted only 2 months left on his CC50 run, but I thought his fall would slow as the most die-hard fans are less likely to switch their votes from Interest to Disinterest. So far, the statistical projections are looking more accurate than my gut feeling (an all-too-common occurrence around here), and August 2025 may very well be New England’s folk darling’s last tangle with the CC50 charts unless we see a dramatic, unexpected career shift from him.
- Overall listener interest increased dramatically in July, with an Interest percentage of 40.5% (indicating that the average artist on the CC50 has 4 in 10 audience members interested in their releases). Coincidentally, this marks the highest interest level since July 2024 of last year, part of a larger trend that sees stronger interest in the summer months. The overall vote count remained very high as well, at 504,754, close on the heels of April and June’s record vote counts.
Wildcard Watch
Last month, we spent much of the Wildcard Watch gushing about Vincent Mason’s opportunity to make a splash in his (second) CC50 debut after garnering a whopping 75% Interest vote in June’s Wildcard voting. Sure enough, while not quite as breathtaking as King George or Parker McCollum’s meteoric debuts, it was plenty impressive as 32.8% of voters said they were interested in his music, landing him a #29 ranking. On top of those impressive numbers, he logged a CC50-high Interest-Engagement gap of 8, above the likes of CoJo, Muscadine Bloodline, and Vincent Mason. For those of you unfamiliawr with our new metric, the Interest-Engagement gap, I go into detail about it in last month’s Inside the CC50; you can read about it there. In short, though, it means he has room to grow as relatively few people have opinions about him, but those who do think highly of him. All this bodes very well for the young Georgia moving forward. We’ll keep an eye on him moving forward.
There aren’t any clear breakouts in this month’s batch of promotions, but there are some fairly large brands that have seemed to be gathering momentum recently, particularly Blake Shelton and Thomas Rhett. While their recent releases have mostly packed the standout qualities that made listeners fall in love with them over a decade ago, they still have steam left in the tank, and new releases scratch the itch for their dedicated fans. CC50 veterans Warren Zeiders, Jelly Roll, and Sturgill Simpson round out the five promotions.
Thanks for joining me here again this month. Writing this column provided a welcome relief from being bombarded with the latest news of my Minnesota Twins tearing down the team at the Trade Deadline. But hey, it could always be worse. I could be a Braves fan and not have a single healthy starting pitcher on the roster. 😉 I’ll sign off before I offend half my readership with a reference to the 1991 World Series, see y’all back here in August!
