Music City Impact Report: The Power Players Behind 2017’s Most Consumed Country Artists

As 2017 draws to a close, who in the Nashville community had the biggest impact on Music City so far? Variety teamed up with BuzzAngle Music to analyze the teams that support the top 20 most consumed country artists (ranked by project units, which factors album sales, song sales, on-demand audio and video streams, radio airplay and Shazam tags, from January 1 through Aug. 31, 2017), with special attention given to CMT’s Artist of the Year honorees: Jason Aldean, Luke Bryan, Florida Georgia Line, Chris Stapleton and Keith Urban.

The 2017 Music City Impact Report recognizes the managers, agents, publishers, songwriters, producers, publicists, attorneys and label executives — like Universal Music Group’s Mike Dungan, pictured above with Kacey Musgraves — who played pivotal roles in the year’s biggest country success stories. See a gallery of the honorees here and survey BuzzAngle’s country artist ranking below.

Artist Ranking by Project (Country)

1. Chris Stapleton (1,066,977 project units)

2. Zac Brown Band (668,584)

3. Florida Georgia Line (661,358)

4. Sam Hunt (624,756)

5. Luke Bryan (622,511)

6. Keith Urban (593,853)

7. Jason Aldean (516,273)

8. Eric Church (480,963)

9. Garth Brooks (463,045)

10. Johnny Cash (462,757)

11. Blake Shelton (461,424)

12. Thomas Rhett (458,122)

13. Miranda Lambert (427,588)

14. Brantley Gilbert (425,775)

15. Kenny Chesney (392,235)

16. Tim McGraw (369,114)

17. Little Big Town (364,411)

18. George Strait (351,681)

19. Carrie Underwood (322,321)

20. Dierks Bentley (315,410)

Source: BuzzAngle Music, Total consumption by project from Jan. 1 2017 through Aug. 31 2017

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