Hunter Hayes is the debut studio album by American country musician Hunter Hayes. It was released on October 11, 2011, by Atlantic Records.[1] Hayes wrote or co-wrote every track on the album and plays every instrument and sings every vocal track[2] with the exception of the Encore tracks.
Hunter Hayes moved to Nashville in 2009, and Rascal Flatts recorded a song he co-wrote, "Play," on their 2010 album Nothing Like This. The producer on the Rascal Flatts album, Dann Huff, then teamed up with Hayes to produce Hayes' first major-label album after he signed a recording contract with Atlantic Records.[4] For the album, he intended to do it his own way, "playing everything on the album, having fun and experimenting."[5] He wrote or co-wrote every songs in the album, and played every instrument, and co-produced the project with Dann Huff.[6]
The first singles released from the album was "Storm Warning" which he co-wrote with Gordie Sampson and busbee. The single was a moderate hit, but his next single Wanted became a considerable success, hitting No. 1 on the Hot Country Songs chart.
A deluxe edition of the album, titled Encore, was released in June 2013 with five new tracks, including the singles "I Want Crazy" and a duet version of "Everybody's Got Somebody but Me" that he re-recorded with Jason Mraz. Hayes said that really wanted "I Want Crazy" to be on a record and that it was a new direction for him musically.[7] "Light Me Up", a track from the Encore edition, was re-recorded for Hayes' 2015 UK-only compilation, I Want Crazy, and was released as that record's second single in March 2015.[8]
The album is generally well received by the critics. Stephen Thomas Erlewine of Allmusic thought that Hayes, "while happy with the middle of the road", "also has crisp, bright, relentless melodies designed to win over any audience.[9] Billy Dukes of Taste of Country was impressed that Hayes wrote, produced and played every instrument on his debut album, but thought that the "lack of participants leaves a tonal homogeneity." He also felt the songs "feel at times plastic," but "what Hayes lacks in "wow" he makes up for with a consistency most artists hope to achieve by album three." Matt Bjorke of Roughstock was enthusiastic and considered it a "fantastic debut album," and that it "really only feels like the beginning of a superstar career for an artist who is able to rise above looking like the next matinee idol on the cover of this record."[10]
The album peaked at No. 18 on the Billboard 200 and No. 7 on the Country Albums chart, with 18,000 copies sold in the United States during its initial week.[12] With the success of the song "Wanted", sales of the album also increased. In June 2013, on its 71st week, it jumped to No. 7 on the Billboard 200 with the release of the deluxe version of the album, Encore, selling 40,000 copies for the week.[13] The album was certified platinum by the (RIAA) on August 8, 2013, and as of February 2014, the album including the Encore edition has sold 1,105,000 copies in the US.[14]
The album produced 5 singles, 3 of them were consecutive No. 1s on the country charts. A total of over 8 million singles were sold from the album.[15]
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