Carnival Ride

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This article is about the album by Carrie Underwood. For the structures used in amusement parks and carnivals, see Amusement ride.
Untitled

Carnival Ride is the second studio album from American country pop artist Carrie Underwood. It was released in the United States on October 23, 2007.[1][2] It has recently been certified Double Platinum by the RIAA.[3] The album includes the #1 country singles "So Small" and "All-American Girl". The album debuted at #1 on the US Billboard 200 Chart selling 527,000 copies, giving Underwood her first #1 album.

History

Underwood has explained the meaning behind the album's title and theme, saying:

You step onto this ride called life, and it’s a crazy thing you don’t know anything about, but you get on it anyway. You do what you can to lean different directions to try and get it to go where you want it to go, but you can’t stop it – it just keeps moving. That’s why Carnival Ride works as my album title, because it describes the wonderful craziness that I’ve been through over the past couple years.[1]

Carnival Ride became Underwood’s first number-one album on the U.S. Billboard 200, selling 527,000 copies in its first week of release.[4] In its second week the album sold less than 190,000 copies. The album also debuted at number 1 on the Top Digital Albums, Top Country Albums, Top Canadian Albums and the United World Chart.

As of May 21, 2008, Carnival Ride has been present on the U.S. Billboard 200 for 30 weeks, it is at #24 this week. It has sold 2.3 million copies in the U.S. and about 3 million world wide to date.

Reception

Critical reception of the album so far has been mainly positive. The first official review of the album from All Music Guide, gave it 4 out of 5 stars, on par with what they gave her debut. The site classified the album as "completely contemporary country", and said "the remarkable thing about Carnival Ride is that it's stronger song for song than Some Hearts." They also praised the album for having "the appearance of a genuine heart, something that no other big country-pop album has had since the glory days of Come on Over."[5]

USA Today also praised the album for its versatility saying "The songs call for vulnerability (You Won’t Find This), urgency (Flat on the Floor), sympathy (Crazy Dreams, her co-written salute to “the hairbrush singers and dashboard drummers” from whose ranks she sprang), humor (The More Boys I Meet, the tag line of which goes “The more I love my dog”) and extreme role-playing (Last Name’s saga of a bar pickup that turns into an impulsive Vegas marriage). She delivers on all counts."[6] The Boston Herald gave the album a B, and claimed, "Underwood manages enough spunk to occasionally avoid the cookie-cutter."[7]

Individual tracks

Two of this album's tracks have been previously recorded by other artists. "Flat on the Floor" was previously cut by singer Katrina Elam on her unreleased 2007 album Turn Me Up. "I Told You So" is a cover of a song previously cut by Randy Travis on his 1988 album Always & Forever; Travis' version of the song was a Number One hit on the country charts that year.

Track listing

  1. "Flat on the Floor" (Ashley Monroe, Brett James) – 3:18
  2. "All-American Girl" (Ashley Gorley, Carrie Underwood, Kelley Lovelace) – 3:32
  3. "So Small" (Luke Laird, Hillary Lindsey, Underwood) – 3:47
  4. "Just a Dream" (Gordie Sampson, Steven McEwan, H. Lindsey) – 4:44
  5. "Get Out of This Town" (Gordie Sampson, McEwan, H. Lindsey) – 3:02
  6. "Crazy Dreams" (George Barry Dean, Troy Verges, Underwood) – 3:36
  7. "I Know You Won't" (Wendell Mobley, Neil Thrasher, McEwan) – 4:19
  8. "Last Name" (Laird, Lindsey, Underwood) – 4:01
  9. "You Won't Find This" (Cathy Dennis, Tom Shapiro) – 3:19
  10. "I Told You So" (Randy Travis) – 4:17
  11. "The More Boys I Meet" (Scott Kennedy, McEwan) – 3:33
  12. "Twisted" (Laird, H. Lindsey, James) – 3:56
  13. "Wheel of the World" (H. Lindsey, Chris Lindsey, Aimee Mayo) – 4:42

Target Special Edition

Limited Edition CD/DVD versions were available at Target. The DVD included live acoustic performances, as well as a five-part interview.

  1. "So Small"
  2. "Get Out Of This Town"
  3. "Just A Dream"
  4. "The More Boys I Meet"

Platinum Musicpass

A special digital copy was released on January 15, 2008, which included a new unreleased track and two music videos.

  1. "Sometimes You Leave" (Chris Tompkins, Kara Dioguardi, Shridhar Solanki) – 4:16
  2. "So Small" (video only)
  3. "Before He Cheats" (video only)

Chart performance

Album

Peak chart positions[4][8][9] Sales
US Country US 200 CAN CAN Country AUS Country World
1 1 1 1 9 1 US: 2× Multi-Platinum[10]

Singles

Year Single Peak chart positions[11][12]
US Country US Hot 100 US Pop 100 US Digital US Christ AC CAN Country CAN Hot 100[A] World
2007 "So Small" 1 17 23 6 21 3 14 28
"All-American Girl" 1 27 50 26 — 1 45 —
2008 "Last Name"[A] 7 19 68 19 — 3 57 —

"—" denotes releases that did not chart.

Notes
  • A ^ Current single.

Certifications

The following table shows the singles that received certifications.

Year Single Certifications Album
2007 "So Small" US: Gold[13] Carnival Ride

References

  1. ^ a b "Carrie Underwood Invites Fans Along for a Carnival Ride" (Press release). Arista Nashville. 2007-08-29. Retrieved 2007-08-30. {{cite press release}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  2. ^ "Carrie Underwood plans fall CD release". MSNBC. 2007-07-17. Retrieved 2007-08-06. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  3. ^ "Carrie Underwood's Carnival Ride Certified Double Platinum, as 2007 Marks Another Milestone Year!" (Press release). Arista Nashville. 2007-12-14. Retrieved 2007-12-16. {{cite press release}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  4. ^ a b Hasty, Katie (2007-10-31). "Underwood Leads Three Country Debuts Onto Chart". Billboard Magazine. Retrieved 2007-10-31. Cite error: The named reference "Billboard" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
  5. ^ "allmusic (Carnival Ride)". allmusic. Retrieved 2007-10-23.
  6. ^ "USA Today (Carnival Ride)". USA Today. Retrieved 2007-10-24.
  7. ^ "Boston Herald (Carnival Ride)". Boston Herald. Retrieved 2007-10-24.
  8. ^ Williams, John. "Carrie Underwood rides to No. 1". Canoe.ca. Retrieved 2008-02-09.
  9. ^ World Chart Positions. acharts.us. Retrieved February 7, 2008.
  10. ^ "Carrie Underwood's Carnival Ride Certified Double Platinum, as 2007 Marks Another Milestone Year!" (Press release). Arista Nashville. 2007-12-14. Retrieved 2007-12-16. {{cite press release}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  11. ^ "Artist Chart History - Carrie Underwood". Billboard. Retrieved 2007-02-09.
  12. ^ "Carrie Underwood - Music Charts". acharts.us. Retrieved 2008-02-09.
  13. ^ "Latest single certifications". Billboard. Retrieved 2008-02-20.
Preceded by Top Country Albums
November 10, 2007 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Billboard 200 number-one album
November 102007
Preceded by United World Chart number-one album
November 10, 2007
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