Luke Bryan continues to dominate all things country, as featured in his most recent feat: The country star is the first performer in the history of the Country Airplay charts to be featured in both the no. 1 and no. 2 position for a given week. Nielsen Soundscan has been tracking country airplay independent of other sales factors since 1990.
The songs that helped Bryan take the cake were his no. 1 hit "Play It Again," which jumped from no. 3 to the top spot, and "This Is How We Roll," a track from Florida Georgia Line in which Bryan makes an appearance.
It's significant to recognize that this record applies only to radio play numbers, but Bryan hasn't been hurting in terms of sales or streaming either. Those factors, taken into consideration with airplay, go into determining the Hot Country Songs chart, on which Bryan has placed nos. 1 and 2 for four of the past five weeks (for the same tracks). Although Bryan shares that feat with two other performers-Taylor Swift and legend Buck Owens-the fact might be even more impressive than his new record, considering that Billboard has tracked the Hot Country Songs since 1958. Owens was the first to accomplish the deed during 1964 with his hits "Together Again" and "My Heart Skips A Beat," while Swift hit it during 2012 with "We Are Never Getting Back Together" and "Red."
What Swift and Owens have on Bryan is that they're the main performers listed on both tracks, while Bryan is a guest on "How We Roll." That's not a criticism, as Bryan isn't the only big name using guest vehicles to travel to the top of the charts: Iggy Azalea is currently at no. 1 on the Digital Downloads charts as part of Ariana Grande's "Problem" while holding down no. 2 with her own "Fancy."
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