Scotty McCreery and Hootie & the Blowfish climb two spots to the top of Billboard’s Country Airplay chart (dated Oct. 4) with “Bottle Rockets,” marking unique feats for McCreery and the band’s frontman, Darius Rucker, as well as McCreery’s label, Triple Tigers.
The single, which features newly recorded vocals from Hootie & the Blowfish built around its classic song “Hold My Hand,” credits 11 writers, including McCreery, Rucker and producer Frank Rogers. It increased by 14% to 30.5 million audience impressions in the Sept. 19-25 tracking week, according to Luminate. “Hold My Hand” became Hootie’s first major hit, reaching No. 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1995.
The ascent of “Bottle Rockets” to No. 1 puts Rucker in exclusive company with Tyler Hubbard. They are now the only artists who have ruled Country Airplay both as solo acts and with a duo or group, dating to the chart’s start in January 1990. Hubbard scored 16 leaders as half of Florida Georgia Line before earning the first of three solo No. 1s with 2022’s “5 Foot 9.” Rucker has collected nine No. 1s as a solo artist, beginning with “Don’t Think I Don’t Think About It” in 2008.
Triple Tigers, launched in 2016 as a joint venture between Thirty Tigers, Sony Music Entertainment-owned distributor The Orchard and Triple 8 Management, also notches a milestone. Directly following Russell Dickerson’s two-week reign with “Happen to Me,” “Bottle Rockets” gives the label its first successive Country Airplay No. 1s. To date, the imprint has powered 11 singles to the top, six by McCreery and five by Dickerson.
Meanwhile, “Bottle Rockets” joins such Country Airplay No. 1s that interpolate prior hits as Cole Swindell’s “She Had Me at Heads Carolina,” his 2022 leader that reimagines Jo Dee Messina’s 1996 breakthrough single, “Heads Carolina, Tails California.”
For the 31-year-old McCreery, “Bottle Rockets” is his first Country Airplay leader since “Damn Strait,” which spent three weeks at No. 1 in 2022. He wraps his quickest trip to the top spot: 20 weeks, nearly halving his previous fastest coronation (37 weeks for “This Is It” in 2018-19).