{"id":1962001,"date":"2026-05-29T14:58:25","date_gmt":"2026-05-29T11:58:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1962001"},"modified":"2026-05-29T14:58:25","modified_gmt":"2026-05-29T11:58:25","slug":"ella-langley-morgan-wallen-more-inside-country-musics-historic-decade-and-whats-to-expect-next-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1962001","title":{"rendered":"Ella Langley, Morgan Wallen & More: Inside Country Music\u2019s Historic Decade and What\u2019s To Expect Next"},"content":{"rendered":"

[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.billboard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/country-stars-illo-credit-maria-contreras-2026-bb6-billboard-1800.jpg?w=1024″]<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\tTrending on Billboard\t\t<\/h3>\n<\/div>\n

\n\tBy the time Ella Langley\u2019s second album, Dandelion<\/em>, arrived April\u00a010, the country star had already made chart history several times over \u2014 and symbolized the commercial boom that country music has experienced in the 2020s. All decade long, artists like Langley, Morgan Wallen and Megan Moroney have been smashing records and spilling over onto the pop charts, yielding one of country music\u2019s most culturally significant eras.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn February, for example, Langley\u2019s \u201cChoosin\u2019 Texas\u201d accomplished an unpredecented hat trick, making her the first woman to concurrently hit No.\u00a01 on the Billboard Hot\u00a0100, Hot Country Songs and Country Airplay charts. By March, she and Moroney became the first women who primarily record country music to simultaneously top the Hot\u00a0100 and Billboard\u00a0200 (with Langley\u2019s \u201cChoosin\u2019 Texas\u201d and Moroney\u2019s Cloud\u00a09<\/em>, \u00adrespectively). As Langley told Billboard<\/em> in April, \u201cEvery day I wake up, it\u2019s like something more insane has happened.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\tRelated\t\t<\/p>\n<\/h3>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Riley<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\t\t\t\t\tAfter Slow-Burn Rise, Riley Green Is Red Hot: \u2018If This Had Happened To Me When I Was 22, It Would Have Been\u00a0Mayhem\u2019\t\t<\/p>\n<\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Miranda<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\t\t\t\t\t\u2018I Know the Right Way To Do It, Because I Did It Wrong\u2019: How Miranda Lambert Became a Hitmaker and\u00a0Mentor\t\t<\/p>\n<\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Red<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\t\t\t\t\tHow The Red Clay Strays Took Over Country Without Taking Over The Airwaves: \u2018Radio Is\u00a0Dead\u2019\t\t<\/p>\n<\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n\tUpon its release, Dandelion<\/em> debuted atop the Billboard\u00a0200 and Top Country Albums, making Langley one of just eight women to launch an album on the latter chart with at least 100,000 weekly units. And of those eight, two others also released albums this year: Moroney\u2019s Cloud\u00a09<\/em> and Kacey Musgraves\u2019 Middle of Nowhere<\/em> (joining Beyonc\u00e9, Taylor Swift, Dolly Parton, Carrie Underwood and Shania Twain). Since Dandelion<\/em> arrived, it has remained No.\u00a01 on Top Country Albums, setting a modern-era record (referring to 2017 onward) for the chart as the first album by a woman to earn 100,000-plus units for five consecutive weeks.<\/p>\n

\n\tAll the while, Langley has maintained her reign atop Hot Country Songs and the Hot\u00a0100, with \u201cChoosin\u2019 Texas\u201d ruling for 26 weeks on the former (through May\u00a030) and 10 weeks on the latter (through May\u00a023). More history has followed: As \u201cChoosin\u2019 Texas\u201d and \u201cBe Her\u201d held at Nos.\u00a01 and 2, respectively, on the Hot\u00a0100, Langley became the first artist known for primarily recording country music in the chart\u2019s 67-year history to simultaneously occupy the list\u2019s top two spots for multiple weeks (May\u00a06 and 23). The last country artist to come close? Wallen pulled it off for one week in May 2025.<\/p>\n

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\n\tWallen has, without a doubt, led the charge for country music\u2019s record-shattering run. The 2021 release of his Dangerous: The Double Album<\/em> set things in motion by spending a record 97 weeks at No.\u00a01 on Top Country Albums. He dethroned himself with his 2023 set, One Thing at a Time<\/em>, which topped the list for a second-place 87 weeks, and he continued his historic run with 2025\u2019s I\u2019m the Problem<\/em>, which set a then-weekly record of 37 Hot\u00a0100 entries (he once again replaced himself, as he held the previous record at 36).<\/p>\n

\n\tWallen\u2019s rise runs parallel to country\u2019s rising streaming numbers. The genre hit a new high in the United States at the start of 2020 with a record 1.24\u00a0billion on-\u00addemand audio streams of its songs, according to Luminate. By 2023, country had become the fastest-\u00adgrowing U.S. format for on-demand audio streaming. And in the first six months of 2025, country was the most common genre in the Hot\u00a0100\u2019s top\u00a010, claiming 29% of all top\u00a010 hits, according to Hit Songs Deconstructed.<\/p>\n

\n\tThis decade, so far, the genre has also become more diverse: In April 2024, Shaboozey and Beyonc\u00e9 made history on Hot Country Songs when the former\u2019s \u201cA Bar Song (Tipsy)\u201d replaced the latter\u2019s \u201cTexas Hold \u2019Em\u201d at No.\u00a01, marking the first time two Black artists led the ranking back-to-back. And they continued to break chart records throughout the year. When Beyonc\u00e9\u2019s Cowboy Carter <\/em>debuted at No.\u00a01 on Top Country Albums, it was the first time a Black woman led the list. By the year\u2019s end, \u201cA Bar Song\u201d tied for the then-longest-reigning Hot\u00a0100 chart-\u00adtopper when it hit its 19th week at No.\u00a01 in November (matching Lil Nas\u00a0X\u2019s \u201cOld Town Road\u201d featuring Billy Ray Cyrus).<\/p>\n

\n\tThey weren\u2019t the only ones new to the genre to make history: In February 2024, former Christian artist Nate Smith\u2019s \u201cWorld on Fire\u201d tied Wallen for a record 10 weeks at No.\u00a01 on Country Airplay; rap-rocker-turned-country star Jelly Roll became the only soloist with at least four songs to hit No.\u00a01 on Country Airplay and Mainstream Rock Airplay; and \u00adnewcomer Oliver Anthony became the first artist to debut atop the Hot\u00a0100 \u2014 with his viral \u201cRich Men North of Richmond\u201d \u2014 without previously appearing on any Billboard<\/em> ranking. Plus, three icons made history this decade as well: In 2023, Luke Combs became the only artist to place two titles with no billed collaborators in the top two on Country Airplay simultaneously (\u201cLove You Anyway\u201d and \u201cFast Car\u201d) \u2014 and he did it again this April with \u201cSleepless in a Hotel Room\u201d and \u201cDays Like These\u201d; \u201cFast Car\u201d also helped Tracy Chapman make history, as she became the first Black woman to have solely penned a Country Airplay No.\u00a01; and country legend Dolly Parton made personal history when her 2023 album, Rockstar<\/em>, marked her career-best on the Billboard\u00a0200, debuting at No.\u00a03. And with such rising stars as Alexandra Kay, Carter Faith and Stella Lefty making strides of their own, women in country are poised to dominate the latter half of the decade.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cSeeing women at the top of the charts together is incredible,\u201d Langley recently told Billboard<\/em>. \u201cIt\u2019s a testament to the stories we\u2019re telling and how they\u2019re resonating with fans.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tLainey Wilson \u2014 who made her own chart history in 2023, accomplishing the fastest return by a woman to No.\u00a01 on Country Airplay when her collaboration \u201cSave Me\u201d with Jelly Roll topped the tally just six weeks after her single \u201cWatermelon Moonshine\u201d \u2014 shares Langley\u2019s sentiment. As she told Billboard<\/em> in April at Women in Music, where she presented Langley with the Powerhouse honor, \u201cI\u2019ve been telling the boys for a long time, \u2018Y\u2019all ain\u2019t seen nothing.\u2019 And that\u2019s exactly what\u2019s happening right now. These girls are making history and doing things that we didn\u2019t even know could happen.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Additional reporting by Russ Penuell.<\/em><\/p>\n

This story appears in the May 30, 2026, issue of <\/em>Billboard.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

[analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.billboard.com\/music\/country\/country-music-charts-boom-ella-langley-morgan-wallen-1236258406\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.billboard.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/country-stars-illo-credit-maria-contreras-2026-bb6-billboard-1800.jpg?w=1024″] Trending on Billboard By the time Ella Langley\u2019s second album, Dandelion, arrived April\u00a010, the country star had already made chart history several times over \u2014 and symbolized the commercial boom that country music has experienced in the 2020s. All decade long, artists like Langley, Morgan Wallen and Megan Moroney have been smashing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[48,226],"class_list":["post-1962001","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-billboard-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1962001","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1962001"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1962001\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1962001"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1962001"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1962001"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}