Luke Combs has accomplished an extremely rare feat in country music, since every single he’s ever released — dating back to “Hurricane” in 2016 — has gone straight to number one.
Now, with “Forever After All” poised to become his eleventh chart topper in a matter of days, you have to wonder: Does that give Luke a greater sense of creative freedom or put pressure on him to keep his winning ways going?
“You would think it makes it easier,” Luke tells ABC Audio, “but I think in some ways it makes it a little bit harder. You know what I mean?”
“You know, you have a tendency to overanalyze,” he confesses, “like, why it’s doing this and do[ing] that. And so I try to not get really wrapped up in that.”
“You know, I try to not pay attention to that as much as I can,” he adds. “But it’s tough, man, you know.”
At the same time, Luke already seems to have made peace with the fact that his string of number ones inevitably can’t go on forever.
“You don’t want to, like, break the streak. And, you know, that’s bound to happen at some point,” he reflects. “And I’m not afraid of that, but I try to not let that play into my decision making at all, you know?” (AUDIO IS ABC 1-ON-1)
While Luke has the longest current string of number ones, he’s not the only with an impressive streak going. Brett Young has seven consecutive chart toppers to his credit, going back to “Sleep Without You” in 2016, and Russell Dickerson has four, starting with “Yours” in 2018.