It’s getting increasingly difficult to argue that any act in country music is bigger than Florida Georgia Line. They’ve amassed 4.2 billion on-demand streams, they’re one of the few acts that can sell out stadiums, and they’re the only country artist in history with an RIAA Diamond-certified single. They’ve scored 15 No. 1 singles and racked up more weeks atop various Billboard charts than most of their country-music colleagues combined.
The duo’s latest impressive accomplishment comes this week as “Meant To Be,” their collaboration with Bebe Rexha, becomes the longest-running No. 1 song in the history of Billboard’s 60-year-old Hot Country Songs chart. Hot Country Songs combines radio play, sales, and streaming to anoint country’s biggest song each week. “Meant To Be” has spent 35 consecutive weeks — the entirety of 2018 and then some — at No. 1 since debuting there last December.
The song passes Sam Hunt’s 2017 smash “Body Like a Back Road,” which led the chart for 34 weeks. It took almost five decades for a song to spend more than 16 weeks at No. 1, but Florida Georgia Line has done it three times in six years. In 2012, their breakout mega-hit “Cruise” spent 24 weeks at the chart’s summit, smashing the previous record of 16 weeks that was set 48 years earlier. Additionally, FGL’s “H.O.L.Y. reigned for 18 weeks in 2016.
“For Florida Georgia Line to have three [songs] in the top five is absolutely nuclear,” BMLG executive VP Jimmy Harnen told Billboard. “We send out a big thank you to all of the believers.”
This isn’t the first history-making feat for FGL this year: earlier this summer, they became the first act ever to simultaneously top three Billboard charts — Country Airplay, Country Digital Song Sales, and Country Streaming Songs — with three different songs: "Up Down," "Meant to Be," and "Simple." The first is a collaboration with rising country act, Morgan Wallen and the third is the debut single from the duo's forthcoming fourth album.
FGL has also now spent more weeks atop Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart than any artist in history. This week marks their 91st total week: George Strait is the runner up, with 84 total weeks. For perspective, Strait had 44 No. 1s on the chart during his run — FGL has had 6. SIX! That's an absolutely astonishing average of 15 weeks per No. 1.
Florida Georgia Line’s accomplishments are even more impressive when one considers the relatively short period of time they’ve been on the scene. Hubbard and Brian Kelley’s debut album dropped less than six years ago, in December 2012. That makes them newbies compared to the genre’s other top-billed stars: Luke Bryan’s first album came in 2007, and Jason Aldean and Carrie Underwood both debuted in 2005. Many staples of country radio date back decades: Tim McGraw, Keith Urban, and Kenny Chesney all debuted in the 1990s.
They're outselling acts who've been at it two or three times as long... and making it look easy. That quick ascent could explain why they are perpetually snubbed by so many awards shows. They’ve never been nominated for a Grammy, despite releasing three of the biggest country songs of the past decade. The Country Music Association’s CMA Awards has never given Entertainer, Song or Single of the Year consideration to the duo, and has awarded its Duo of the Year trophy to another act two years in a row.
Earlier this year, Big Machine Label Group CEO and Founder Scott Borchetta told me, “The guys were extremely successful from their very first single. That allowed them to skip some steps in their ascent as the demand for them on the road from the very beginning was insane and they became headliners very quickly. That took them away from some of the traditional building blocks in the industry in regard to having time to do extended radio tours, being present at a lot of Nashville industry functions and, perhaps, we suffer from a little industry jealousy because success came so fast.”
As if there's a chance the music thing won't work out, Kelley and Hubbard are rapidly diversifying their portfolios. Their multi-level FGL House bar is one of the most popular destinations in Nashville, and they’ve dropped hints to fans that a second location (a “Boat House”) is coming soon to Florida. They have their own whiskey label – Old Camp Peach Pecan Whiskey — and have been frequently tapped for partnerships with brands like Budweiser. They will stage their inaugural FGL Fest later this summer. The duo owns the event space meet+greet in Nashville, where it headquarters its publishing company, Tree Vibez Music, and Tribe Kelley, the clothing brand Kelley owns with his wife, Brittney.
The group’s fourth studio album is expected soon. Fan response will likely not do much to help quell the industry jealousy — the album will almost certainly follow in the footsteps of the band’s previous three and make itself comfortable at No. 1.
