Jason Aldean Scores Only Platinum-Certified Country Album of 2014

Jason Aldean is in elite — and extremely sparse — company in 2014’s heavy metal club.

The country star is one of only three artists to achieve RIAA platinum sales certification on an album released this year. His Old Boots, New Dirt LP, which debuted at the top of Billboard’s all-genre Top 200 chart in October, has now shipped more than one million units. That means he’s the only country star to release a platinum-seller in 2014, and joins only Taylor Swift and Ariana Grande in platinum album certifications for collections released this year.

“We put so much time and passion into choosing the best songs for this album, and this brings a lot of hard work full circle for me,” Aldean writes in a statement. “It’s like Christmas came early! I couldn’t do it without the best country music fans in the world, who never stop believing in what I do and always follow me, even if I may take a creative left turn every now and then.”

Old Boots, New Dirt had more than three million Spotify streams during its first week, setting the record for the biggest country album debut on the music streaming service. (He later yanked the project from Spotify, explaining, ” I want everyone who is involved in making my music to be paid fairly.”) Additionally, the album had the fourth biggest debut week in all genres this year, selling more than 278,000 copies in its premiere week. Its first single, “Burnin’ It Down,” was Aldean’s first tune to ever top the all-genre Digital Songs chart.

British pop sensation Sam Smith’s debut, In the Lonely Hour is expected to join the Aldean, Swift and Grande albums as the fourth 2014 platinum-certified by the end of the year. To compare, ten albums went platinum last year, including projects by Luke Bryan, Florida Georgia Line and Blake Shelton.