(January 17, 2025). In January 2021, Taylor Swift’s Evermore was unseated at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 by an unlikely contender: a sophomore album by a rising country star from Sneedville, TN. Few could have guessed that Morgan Wallen’s Dangerous: The Double Album would remain a chart juggernaut for the next four years, its entire run spent in the chart’s top quartile and coinciding with the presidency of a man whose ideologies many of the artist’s fans have eschewed since Day One.
Wallen’s Dangerous debuted at No. 1 on the chart dated January 23, 2021, the same week President Joe Biden was inaugurated to what would be a single term in office.
Dangerous has logged 209 consecutive weeks — four straight years and counting — in the Top 50, including 158 weeks in the Top 10…second only to the cast recording of My Fair Lady soundtrack’s 173 weeks (1962-66) in Billboard album chart history.
Its lowest position yet — No. 44 — happened just two weeks ago when the annual onslaught of holiday albums pushed it out of the top 40 for the first time. In fact, the only time it’s even been outside the Top 20 is during the holiday season each year when Christmas albums take over.
But like clockwork, Christmas music gives way to secular fare every January, and Wallen’s Dangerous has found itself lodged in the top 20 every week of Biden’s presidency that didn’t include Christmas carols, tinsel and garland.
The connection to Biden’s singular term is relevant, as Wallen has long been a symbol of the somewhat politically charged — and conservative-leaning — anti-cancel culture movement. Just days after the album’s chart debut, the country music superstar was caught up in a controversy that saw the industry banning him from awards shows, radio stations, and curated playlists on streaming platforms.
At the same time, the album defiantly continued to top the chart, spending its first ten weeks at No. 1 — a first for any country album. It relinquished the top spot in April 2021 but, thanks to streaming, remained perched in the top ten throughout 2021 and into the next three years, slowly rising in the ranks of albums with the most top-ten weeks and eventually eclipsing blockbuster LPs like Michael Jackson’s Thriller and Adele’s 21.
But unlike albums such as Thriller and 21, whose universal appeal transcended demographics and united listeners across generations and genres, Dangerous found its strength in a more targeted audience. Wallen’s record has become a cultural touchstone for fans who felt alienated by mainstream politics and sought solace in the album’s everyman themes. Yet, despite its niche appeal, Dangerous has outperformed those iconic blockbusters on the charts, surpassing 21’s long-held position as Billboard’s top album of the 21st century and usurping Thriller’s legacy as one of the greatest-charting albums of all time (despite Jackson’s album remaining the world’s bestseller, regardless of chart performance).
To his fans, Wallen’s punishment in 2021 was seen as a persecution, one tied to the left’s penchant for political correctness and one viewed as an extreme reaction to an ugly moment captured on video that made Wallen the latest villain in the post-George Floyd 2020s.
The right’s response? Stream and download Dangerous until the cows come home and keep it at or near the top of the charts. It’s a task made easy when a protest doesn’t include having to go to a brick-and-mortar record store and making a physical purchase. Instead, Wallen’s supporters can simply point and click their unwitting hero’s way into music chart history through streaming.
On Wednesday (Jan. 15), Biden gave his farewell address to a nation he led for four politically charged years. Next week, his predecessor will reclaim his residence at the White House. Meanwhile, Wallen’s Dangerous will begin its fifth year on the Billboard 200, still taking up residence inside the top 20, where it currently sits at No. 14.
Let’s face it, the songs on Dangerous may not be as iconic or even memorable as those on 21 or Thriller, but the album that became a symbol of resistance against perceived cancel culture has now outlasted the 46th president whose term coincided with its reign, an achievement rooted as much in protest streams as it is in the album’s whiskey-drenched appeal. With Biden’s presidency now consigned to history, perhaps Dangerous can finally chart a less politically charged course — or will it continue defying the odds, just like the cultural moment that elevated it?
DJRob
DJRob (he/him) is a freelance music blogger from the East Coast who covers R&B, hip-hop, disco, pop, rock and country genres – plus lots of music news and current stuff! You can follow him on Bluesky at @djrobblog.bsky.social, X (formerly Twitter) at @djrobblog, on Facebook or on Meta’s Threads.
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