Brett Eldredge & Jimmy Buffett Decorate Top Country Albums Chart With New Holiday Sets

11/9/2016 by Jim Asker

Rick Diamond/Getty Images for Target

Brett Eldredge and Target give Nashville families both a trick and a treat to promote his Target exclusive holiday album, "Glow" on Oct. 31, 2016 in Nashville, Tenn.

Their new seasonal gifts begin at Nos. 2 & 6, respectively.

Brett Eldredge's first holiday album, Glow, dashes in at No. 2 on Billboard's Top Country Albums chart (dated Nov. 19), selling 14,000 copies in its first week, according to Nielsen Music.

Eldredge, well known for his admiration of vocal stylists like Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby and Dean Martin, among others, recorded the 12-song set that includes such classics as "Baby, It's Cold Outside" (featuring Meghan Trainor), "White Christmas" and "Winter Wonderland."

Glow is Eldredge's third entry on Top Country Albums, following Illinois, which debuted at No. 1 on the chart dated Oct. 3, 2015 (44,000 sold), and his debut LP, Bring You Back, which debuted and peaked at No. 2 on Aug. 24, 2013 (21,000).

Concurrently, Jimmy Buffett's 'Tis the Season enters Top Country Albums at No. 6 (10,000), marking his 15th showing on the list and seventh top 10. Buffett last landed on Top Country Albums with 2007's Live at Texas Stadium with Alan Jackson and George Strait. His most recent solo album to place on the chart was 2006's Take the Weather With You, his second leader; License to Chill led in 2004. Buffett first hit the Top Country Albums top 10 with Changes in Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes, which peaked at No. 2 in 1977.

(Before appearing on Billboard's charts, Buffett learned firsthand how they work: he was Billboard's Nashville correspondent following his graduation from the University of Southern Mississippi in 1969.)

'Tis the Season is Buffett's second holiday LP. He released his first 20 years ago: Christmas Island sailed to No. 27 on the Billboard 200 in December 1996. (The two releases were perhaps predetermined: he was born Dec. 25, 1946.)

Meanwhile, in between Eldredge and Buffett's seasonal arrivals, Cole Swindell's new EP Down Home Sessions lll enters Top Country Albums at No. 5 (11,000 sold). The five-song set lines up with his Down Home Tour, which kicked off Oct. 26 in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and wraps Dec. 16 in Greenville, South Carolina. Swindell earns his highest-charting of three Down Home Sessions EPs; Down Home Sessions ll started and peaked at No. 11 (10,000; Nov. 28, 2015) and the first (Down Home Sessions) arrived and peaked at No. 8 (12,000; Dec. 6, 2014).