Description
Sam Hunt – Southside – Compact Disc
Sam Hunt’s Southside is his second studio album, released on April 3, 2020 through MCA Nashville—and it’s notable before you even hit play because it arrived almost six years after his blockbuster debut Montevallo (2014). That long gap, plus the fact that several major singles were issued well ahead of the album, makes Southside feel like a project assembled over time rather than one short, concentrated “album cycle.”
From a sound standpoint, Southside continues the lane Hunt helped popularize in mainstream country: country songwriting filtered through pop and R&B rhythm, with lots of programmed drums, moody synth textures, and his signature half-sung/half-spoken delivery. It’s not a “band” record—these tracks are built like modern pop productions with country lyrical settings (small-town details, relationship narratives, regret-and-reconciliation themes) and a vocal style that sits somewhere between rap cadence and melodic pop phrasing. The producer/writer credits are split across a large Nashville-and-pop team, with Hunt deeply involved as a co-writer and with longtime collaborators like Zach Crowell and Shane McAnally appearing in key roles.
The single rollout is one of the most important factual parts of the Southside story. The album includes “Body Like a Back Road,” a 2017 stand-alone single that became a massive hit and essentially served as the bridge between the Montevallo era and the eventual second album. It was followed by songs like “Downtown’s Dead” (2018), and then “Kinfolks” (late 2019), which became one of the defining radio tracks of the Southside cycle. The album’s title track “Southside” was released close to the album drop, and “Hard to Forget” became another key single shortly after release.
Commercially, Southside opened big. It debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, giving Hunt his first U.S. No. 1 album, and it also topped the Top Country Albums chart. That debut mattered because it confirmed that his audience held through the long gap between albums and the drawn-out single strategy.
In terms of what listeners actually get on the CD, Southside is built around relationship writing with a consistent emotional tone: nostalgia, second-guessing, commitment anxiety, reconciliation, and the tension between wanting stability and wanting escape. The tracklist blends immediate, radio-built hooks with slower, more reflective cuts, but the through-line is always Hunt’s voice and cadence—his ability to make modern pop phrasing feel “country” through detail and attitude rather than through traditional instrumentation. If Montevallo was the album that introduced his hybrid style, Southside is the album that shows how firmly he could sustain it as a mainstream template.
Brand new, never played and still in the factory plastic sealed
Track Listing
2016
Hard To Forget
Kinfolks
Young Once
Body Like A Back Road
That Ain’t Beautiful
Let It Down
Downtown’s Dead
Nothing Lasts Forever
Sinning With You
Breaking Up Was Easy In The ’90s
Drinkin’ Too Much
