Mr. Sun, the 10th studio album from ACM, CMA and GRAMMY Award-winning band Little Big Town and released September 16, officially debuts as the Top Country Album by a group in 2022 in addition to taking the No. 1 spot as Current Country Album in pure album sales. The album also marks the band’s seventh debut in the Top 10 on Billboard’s Top Country Albums Chart. Listen to Mr. Sun here.
The album’s lead single “Hell Yeah” hits its highest peak on Billboard’s Country Streaming Songs Chart for the week of October 1, with more than 4.5 million streams during album release week alone. The song has amassed more than 60 million streams to date since its April release.
Mr. Sun has received both fan and critical praise alike, including The New York Times hailing it “a sweeping record” and MusicRow declaring it “the band’s most unique and universal project to date.” Rolling Stone calls it “smooth and sweet, with just the right undercurrent of sadness,” with production that feels “spacious and golden.”
PEOPLE highlights that “the album arrives with all the attributes that are long-established LBT trademarks: the sublime vocal blends, the sumptuous production, the subtle influences of other legendary harmonizers like the Eagles and the Bee Gees… Add to that the evocative songwriting… and a full spectrum of musical moods … Also at the forefront is music that speaks to what matters most to the quartet — love, family and friendship.”
American Songwriter additionally observed that “inside the record, notes reminiscent of the Bee Gees, Fleetwood Mac, and the Eagles ring out, but they’re all tailored to Little Big Town’s country expertise.”
Billboard singles out the album’s “swelling” closing track “Friends of Mine,” as a “benediction to finding the collective strength to persevere through tough times,” while Rolling Stone further ties it to the full record: “Like much of Mr. Sun, it feels like a warm embrace from a loved one.”
Little Big Town spent all summer bringing their exceptional live shows to fans worldwide – they recently wrapped up The Bandwagon Tour with Miranda Lambert and joined The Eagles on all dates of their European stadium tour this summer. Next month, Little Big Town will join Wynonna Judd on select dates of The Judds: The Final Tour in Duluth, GA (October 14) and Huntsville, AL (October 15). For more news, tour dates, and information, please visit www.LittleBigTown.com.
Audio / Little Big Town's Karen Fairchild talks about the title track from their new album, Mr. Sun.
DownloadLBT (Mr. Sun) OC: …studio record. 1:13
KAREN: “’Mr. Sun’ is the title track of the record, and it’s a song that we didn’t write. Sarah Buxton and Daniel Tashian wrote this song. Daniel sent it to me one day and when I heard it, I was like ‘Wow,’ there’s the title of the record you know, we were trying to find something that really encapsulated the whole vibe of the record, and ‘Mr. Sun,’ although it sounds like it’s gonna be a happy song, it’s actually a very melancholy song, and beautiful guitar work on this song and kinda old school 70s harmonies, but it’s a song about asking sun not to shine because his girl is gone and he can’t take it today, and we really loved the way that fit in the whole like sunnier vibe of what this whole record is about. You got your ‘Rich Man’ and ‘Friends of Mine’ and these songs that really remind us of things that are important in life and also you know heartache is a part of it as well and learning to let go, so that’s the way that ‘Mr. Sun’ fits in on being the title track of our tenth studio record.”
