Thirty years later, “Travelin’ Soldier” still carries well-earned weight in the country music world. Look for no further proof than Cody Johnson, a well-beloved artist with too many hits to count. Yet despite being the only artist to *never* miss the top five (a remarkable feat in its own right), it took releasing a cover of Bruce Robison’s classic ballad popularized by the Dixie Chicks for him to finally claim the CC50 crown. Notably, this marks only the third time in CC50 that we have three different #1s in three consecutive years. It was a big movement month across the top of the chart, with 10 of the top 15 recording a change in Interest of greater than +/-2%. Ella Langley also surged into the top 5 for the first time, joining Meg Moroney as the only other female artist to join such rarified air. Vincent Mason had a great month as well, surging a full 13 spots. The full chart is below:
Biggest Risers
Make that back-to-back months in the biggest riser appearances for Ole 60. The group has been slowly building a base with their unique blend of Appalachian and rock sounds, and the build-up to the release of their October album Smokestack Town was an undeniable success. They’ve posted consistent gains since the start of summer when they started releasing singles from it, and they didn’t suffer any post-release slump, as the whole album evidently landed well with listeners who handed them a 4 point bump and a #21 ranking. Ella Langley and Vincent Mason continued their excellent 2025s as well, with interest up 9% and 20% on the year, respectively.
Biggest Fallers
The fall doldrums continued for many of the headliners of the CC50, with all five biggest fallers being in the top 15 and 3 of them in the top 10. Green, Adcock, and Combs were due for some regression after very hot runs for both of them over the last few months, but Zach Bryan and Morgan Wallen’s falls are part of larger trends that have to be concerning for both artists. Stapleton narrowly missed his second straight appearance on this list as well, and he has now lost 10 points of Interest since August. The table below shows how significant the slumps we’ve seen across the top 15 have been since the end of summer (August). All but five have posted losses, with 5 of them posting double-digit losses. I’ll take a deeper dive into the seasonality of the CC50 in future columns. Be sure to stay tuned if this interests you!
Quick Hits
- Talking about Cody Johnson’s consistent success over time raised the interesting question: Who has the highest average Interest and average CC50 ranking over the history of the rankings? Interestingly enough, the answer is not Zach Top, Zach Bryan, or Morgan Wallen, owners of nearly all the #1 rankings between them. The answer is also not Cody Johnson, but rather the lovable Luke Combs, who has had a very similar trajectory to CoJo with consistent success but only one CC50 #1 to show for it. The full top 10 is below. Zach Top can only muster 8th place because he spent the better part of 2024 in the bottom half of the rankings before his incredible run in the top spot. Chris Stapleton and Meg Moroney also posted remarkably strong numbers for how little attention they’ve gotten in this column and country news generally, with average rankings of #5 and #8, respectively.
Zach Bryan’s fall, far from slowing, has, if anything, sped up, as he dropped to #14 in November, behind names like Treaty Oak Revival and Hudson Westbrook, who, while winning over fans recently, are still hardly household names. The chart below shows his slide over the last 2 years. Most concerning in the below chart is that the decline in Interest isn’t just an indifference to Zach Bryan, the number of people actively voting that they are disinterested has more than doubled in the last year, giving him the second highest Disinterest% in the whole CC50 (32%), meaning an entire third of voters voted that they are not interested in future Zach Bryan releases. That indicates tough sledding ahead for the former king of the CC50, and nothing coming from him musically or professionally seems to be indicating anything to change that.
Overall listener interest continued its slide, falling to 38.0%, its lowest mark since early last spring (indicating that the average artist on the CC50 has 4 in 10 audience members interested in their releases). The overall vote count was slightly higher than in October, at 335,997.
Wildcard Watch
Our run of good predictions here in the Wildcard Watch corner has my ego dangerously high, as Braxton Keith not only earned a second month in the CC50, but he also made an excellent showing. With over a quarter of CC50 voters saying they are interested in new music from him, he was not only the only wildcard to survive relegation, but he also did so easily, outpacing his fellow wildcards by about an 8-point margin. It’s unclear if anyone in this month’s batch of wildcards will be able to match that success, let alone survive relegation. While both Cody Jinks and Sturgill Simpson broke 50% in the Wildcard Voting, it was a weak turnout month, and both artists have historically struggled in the primary CC50 voting. This will be Sturgill’s 5th promotion of 2025, and he has yet to break 20% Interest (the general benchmark for relegation) in the CC50 – ever. Granted, his last effort in August was painfully close, as he notched a 19.99% Interest mark and narrowly missed survival, but historical performance and lack of anything resembling a recent release make it an uphill climb. Further down the card, Tyler Nance earned his first CC50 call-up, a big step for the young artist from Missouri. “Keeps Me Sane” was an instant hit for him this summer, and just last week, he recorded it as a duet with another up-and-coming force in country, the Castellows.
Many people attribute the higher pessimism that fall and winter bring to a lack of light and colder temperatures, but here at Country Central, we know it is just the lack of baseball everyone has to suffer through these long 4 months. By the time the first pitch of Spring Training is thrown, the wasteland of releases that the holiday season inevitably causes (ERNEST’s November album notwithstanding, more on that in next month’s article!) and falling Interest% across the CC50 will be just a memory, and we’ll all have higher endorphin levels and a little more excitement for new music. In the meantime, enjoy the delightful equinox of college sports, hunting, and eating that November affords, and we’ll see you back here around Christmas!
