Traveller (Chris Stapleton album)
Traveller (Chris Stapleton album)
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Traveller (Chris Stapleton album)

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Traveller (Chris Stapleton album)

Traveller is the debut studio album by American singer-songwriter Chris Stapleton. The album was produced by Dave Cobb and Stapleton, and was released on May 5, 2015, through Mercury Nashville.

Described by music publications as an old-school country, Southern rock record, Traveller received critical acclaim and earned Stapleton several awards. It was named Album of the Year at the 2015 Country Music Association Awards. Furthermore, it received a nomination at the 58th Grammy Awards for Album of the Year and a win for Best Country Album. The song "Traveller" also won Best Country Solo Performance. At the 2016 Academy of Country Music Awards it won Album of the Year, with the song "Nobody to Blame" also winning Song of the Year. It won the Billboard Music Award for Top Country Album in 2016 and 2017.

Traveller reached number one on the US Billboard 200 chart after the 2015 Country Music Association Awards, during which Stapleton and Justin Timberlake performed a well-received duet. The album has been certified quadruple platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and has sold over 2.6 million copies in the United States by November 2019. It was eventually ranked by Billboard as the bestselling country album of the 2010s. It generated three singles: "Traveller", "Nobody to Blame", and "Parachute". "Nobody to Blame" reached the top 10 on the Country Airplay chart. The album track "Fire Away" was accompanied by a music video. Though not released as a radio single, the album track "Tennessee Whiskey" garnered popularity following its performance at the aforementioned CMA awards, reaching number one on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart and number 20 on the Hot 100.

I lost my dad in October 2013 and did a little bit of soul-searching. My wife was kind enough to buy me an old Jeep. We flew out to Phoenix and drove it all the way back to Nashville through the desert. I thought a lot about music and my dad, and the things that he would have liked that I should be doing. Out of that, I actually wrote the song 'Traveller' driving down Interstate 40 through New Mexico. That became the cornerstone for the record and wound up being the title track.

The album is an old-school country record mixed with Southern rock. Tracks on the album feature electric guitar, mandolin, and acoustic guitar. "The Devil Named Music" exclaims the hard life on the road, while "Might As Well Get Stoned" features resignation lyrics. Musically, "Sometimes I Cry" is a blues song, "Nobody to Blame" is a mid-tempo country rock track, and "Fire Away" features a beat in a classic soul-ballad time signature. "Daddy Doesn't Pray Anymore" shrouds reflections about his father in the language of religious backsliding, which was previously covered by Julie Roberts in 2013. In an interview for Rolling Stone, Stapleton commented "If somebody tells me it sounds dated, I'd say that's great, as long as the date is 1978. My favorite things are from then."

Stapleton wrote or co-wrote all but two of the album's 14 tracks. The album features a blues-influenced cover of David Allan Coe's single "Tennessee Whiskey", and Charlie Daniels' "Was It 26", written by Don Sampson.

Producer Dave Cobb originally intended to record the album at Sound Emporium Studios in Nashville, but it was already booked. Cobb had read reports of the impending demolition of the historic RCA Studio A building and its Grand Victor Sound studios, and decided to record Stapleton's debut studio album there, before the building and its recording studios were gone forever.

The album debuted on the Top Country Albums chart at number two, and the Billboard 200 at number 14, selling 27,000 copies in the week ending May 10.

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