Rascal Flatts First Country Act in 14 Years to End the Year With the Best Selling Artist Album

Rascal Flatts First Country Act in 14 Years to End the Year With the Best Selling Artist Album

Me And My Gang the biggest unit debut of 2006 with more than 721,000 in first week

NASHVILLE, Tenn., Dec. 14 /PRNewswire/ -- Rascal Flatts will end the year as the best selling artist across all genres of music. This is the second consecutive year that the band will wrap the year as the best selling country artist, but the first time in fourteen years that a country artist has ended the year with the best selling artist album. Not since Billy Ray Cyrus in 1992 has a country artist finished the year with the best selling artist album across all genres of music.

(Photo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20060412/CLW034 )

In the same year that Rascal Flatts' Me And My Gang takes top honors for the best selling artist album of 2006, it also holds the distinction of having the biggest unit debut of the year, with more than 721,000 units sold when it released in April. Rascal Flatts surpassed the second highest unit debut, Justin Timberlake, by more than 37,000 units. Me And My Gang held the #1 position on SoundScan's weekly Top 200 sales chart for three weeks, more consecutive weeks than any artist in any genre this year.

Me And My Gang is the only artist album released in 2006 to be certified triple platinum by the RIAA for sales of more than 3 million units. The project has delivered two chart topping singles, including the band's first crossover hit, the multi-week AC #1 "What Hurts The Most," and the band's sixth country #1 single, "My Wish." Rascal Flatts became one of only three country artists in the 45 years of shared Country and AC radio chart history to land two different songs in the #1 position on two different genre's radio charts in the same week, when "What Hurts The Most" topped the R&R AC chart in the same week that "My Wish" went to #1 on the Mediabase Country chart.

In 2006, Rascal Flatts was awarded the CMA and ACM Country Group of the Year trophies for the fourth consecutive year. Gary, Jay and Joe Don also took home their very first, and second, American Music Award trophies, winning the Country Group/Duo award and the only fan-voted award of the night, the multi- genre Artist of the Year award.

All of the honors and accolades make it possible for the band to give back to the community in a big way. In September, Rascal Flatts held its second concert in support of the Monroe Carell Jr. Children's Hospital at Vanderbilt, donating 1.4 million since 2005. Both years donations were the largest donations in the hospital's history.

Gary, Jay and Joe Don are looking forward to 2007, anticipating January's People's Choice Awards where they have 3 nominations: Favorite Country Song "What Hurts the Most," Favorite Song from a Movie and Favorite Song Remake for "Life Is A Highway." The band is also excitedly awaiting the Grammy awards in February where the band received its second nomination for Best Country Performance by a Country Duo or Group, this year for "What Hurts The Most." That same month the guys will also kick off their 2007 concert tour, "Me And My Gang 2007," playing 21 cities before wrapping in early April, at which time they will take a break from the road to work on a new album. The band's 2006 tour played to over 1 million fans in 74 cities. A total of 61 of those dates were sold out, including LA's Staples Center, New York's Madison Square Garden, and Nashville's Gaylord Entertainment Center, with multiple venue attendance records broken throughout the tour.

Rascal Flatts has sold more than 13 million units in the six years since the release of their self-titled debut. Feels Like Today is certified quadruple platinum for sales of more than 4 million units while Rascal Flatts and Melt are each certified double platinum. Me And My Gang is the band's fastest selling title to date.

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Photo: NewsCom: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20060412/CLW034
AP Archive: http://photoarchive.ap.org/
PRN Photo Desk, photodesk@prnewswire.com
Source: Lyric Street Records

CONTACT: Cindy Heath of Lyric Street Records, +1-615-963-4865; or Jessie
Schmidt of Schmidt Relations, +1-615-846-3878, for Lyric Street Records

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