Ripcord (album)
Ripcord is the ninth studio album by New Zealand-born Australian country music singer Keith Urban. It was released on 6 May 2016 via Hit Red and Capitol Records Nashville. The album produced the singles "John Cougar, John Deere, John 3:16"; "Break on Me", "Wasted Time", "Blue Ain't Your Color", and "The Fighter". It also features musical artists Nile Rodgers, Pitbull, and Carrie Underwood. Just like his previous album Fuse (2013), Urban co-worked with multiple producers on this one.
Ripcord
6 May 2016
- 2015–16
45:42
- Hit Red
- Capitol Nashville
- Jeff Bhasker
- busbee
- Nathan Chapman
- Nitzan Kaikov
- Dann Huff
- Tyler Johnson
- Johnny Price
- Nile Rodgers
- Keith Urban
- Greg Wells
The album was nominated for Best Country Album at the 59th Annual Grammy Awards. On 7 April 2017, the album was certified Platinum by the RIAA.[2]
Background[edit]
This album has been called Urban's most experimental album to date. Urban told Rolling Stone, "It was a lot of searching, a lot of experimenting, and when you get to work with as many people as I did, you end up with a lot of stuff."
One of the tracks, "Sun Don't Let Me Down" features Pitbull, and Nile Rodgers on guitar. The first verse in that song makes reference to Urban's wife Nicole Kidman's 1995 film To Die For.[3]
Promotion[edit]
Urban promoted the album by performing "Wasted Time" on The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon on 6 May and on The Ellen DeGeneres Show on 12 May 2016.[4][5] Three days after the album was released Urban played a free lunchtime concert in front of the Bridgestone Arena in Nashville on 9 May 2016. He performed tracks from Ripcord such as "Gone Tomorrow (Here Today)" and "Blue Ain't Your Color".[6] Urban embarked on a world tour in support of the album on the RipCORD World Tour, beginning on 2 June 2016.
Singles[edit]
The album's lead single "John Cougar, John Deere, John 3:16" was released on June 9, 2015. It reached number forty on the US Hot 100 and number two on both the Hot Country Songs and Country Airplay charts.[7][8] The song was nominated for Best Country Solo Performance at the 58th Annual Grammy Awards but lost to Chris Stapleton's "Traveler".
The second single "Break on Me" was released on October 23, 2015. It reached number one on the Country Airplay chart and peaked at number six on Hot Country Songs, as well as number 54 on the Hot 100.
"Wasted Time" was released as the third single on April 4, 2016.[9] Like its predecessor, it also reached number one on Country Airplay chart. In addition, it peaked at number four on Hot Country Songs and at number 51 on the Hot 100.
"Blue Ain't Your Color" was released on July 30, 2016 as the album's fourth single by Urban via Snapchat. The song reached number one on both the Hot Country Songs and Country Airplay charts. Also, it reached number 24 on Hot 100.
"The Fighter", a duet with fellow country musician Carrie Underwood, was released as the album's fifth single on February 6, 2017.[10][11] Urban wrote the song with his producer busbee while the two were in London. It was inspired by conversations that Urban had with his wife Nicole Kidman early in their relationship.[12] It peaked at number two on both the Hot Country Songs and Country Airplay chart. It also reached number 38 on the Hot 100 chart.
Commercial performance[edit]
Ripcord debuted at number one in Urban's home country of Australia,[21] and at number 21 in New Zealand.[22] It stayed at number one on the Australian albums chart for a second week, becoming his first album to spend more than one week at the top of that chart.[23] The album was certified Platinum in Australia for shipments of over 70,000 units.
The CD debuted at number 3 on the Canadian Albums chart[24] and was certified Gold for shipments of over 40,000 units.[25]
In the US, it debuted at number one on the Billboard's Top Country Albums chart, becoming Urban's fifth number one album on that chart. The disc also debuted at No. 4 on Billboard 200, earning over 106,000 album-equivalent units (93,000 pure sales) during its first week.[26] The album remained at number one on the Top Country Albums chart for a second week. On April 7, 2017, the album was certified Platinum by the RIAA.[27] As of June 2018, it has sold over 740,700 copies in the United States.[28]