''Van Lear Rose'' is the forty-second solo studio album by American country music singer-songwriter

Loretta Lynn Loretta Lynn (; April 14, 1932 – October 4, 2022) was an American country music singer and songwriter. In a career spanning six decades, Lynn released multiple gold albums. She had numerous hits such as "Hey Loretta", "The Pill (song), The P ...

. It was released on April 27, 2004, by

Interscope Records Interscope Records is an American record label based in Santa Monica, California, owned by Universal Music Group through its Interscope Geffen A&M imprint. Founded in late 1990 by Jimmy Iovine and Ted Field as a $20 million joint venture ...

. The album was produced by

Jack White John Anthony White (; born July 9, 1975) is an American musician who achieved international fame as the guitarist and lead singer of the rock duo the White Stripes. As the White Stripes disbanded, he sought success with his solo career, subse ...

. The album was widely praised by critics, peaking at No. 2 on the US ''

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertis ...

Top Country Albums Top Country Albums is a chart published weekly by '' Billboard'' magazine in the United States. The 50-position chart lists the most popular country music albums in the country, calculated weekly by Broadcast Data Systems based on physical sales ...

chart and at No. 24 on the ''Billboard'' 200, the most successful

crossover Crossover may refer to: Entertainment Music Albums * ''Cross Over'' (album), a 1987 album by Dan Peek, or the title song * ''Crossover'' (Dirty Rotten Imbeciles album), 1987 * ''Crossover'', an album by Intrigue * ''Crossover'', an album by ...

album of Lynn's 60-year career at that point. The track " Portland Oregon" was listed as the 305th best song of the 2000s by Pitchfork Media.

Background

The album was initially intended as a musical experiment, blending the styles of Lynn and producer White. White also co-wrote one track, sings a duet with Lynn, and performs throughout the entire album as a musician. At the time of the album's release, Lynn was 72 and White was 28. The title refers to Lynn's origins as the daughter of a miner working the Van Lear coal mines.

Critical reception

The album was released to glowing reviews and universal acclaim. It received a rating of 97 at

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

, the fourth highest score ever and the second-highest for a female to date. ''

Blender A blender (sometimes called a mixer (from Latin ''mixus, the PPP of miscere eng. to Mix)'' or liquidiser in British English) is a kitchen and laboratory appliance used to mix, crush, purée or emulsify food and other substances. A stationary ...

'' magazine called the album "Some of the most gripping singing you're going to hear all year .... A brave, unrepeatable record that speaks to her whole life."

Stephen Thomas Erlewine Stephen Thomas Erlewine (; born June 18, 1973) is an American music critic and former senior editor for the online music database AllMusic. He is the author of multiple artist biographies and record reviews for AllMusic, as well as a freelance ...

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...

said that "The brilliance of ''Van Lear Rose'' is not just how the two approaches complement each other, but how the record captures the essence of Loretta Lynn's music even as it has flourishes that are distinctly Jack." '' Rhapsody'' ranked the album No. 16 on its "Country’s Best Albums of the Decade" list.

Commercial performance

The album debuted at No. 2 on the US ''

chart, and No. 24 on the US ''Billboard'' 200, selling 37,000 in its first week, the best sales week for Lynn in the Nielsen Soundscan era. It has sold over 233,000 copies in United States as of September 2004. The album's first single, "Miss Being Mrs.", was released in April 2004 and did not chart. Its music video premiered on May 23. The second single, "Portland Oregon", was released in May and did not chart. Two music videos were shot for the single, the first one was filmed on May 18 and was not released. The second version premiered the week of October 25.

Accolades

Grammy Awards

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Best Country Album The Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Country Album is an award presented at the Grammy Awards, a ceremony that was established in 1958 and originally called the Gramophone Awards, to recording artists for quality albums in the country music ge ...

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Best Country Collaboration with Vocals The Grammy Award for Best Country Collaboration with Vocals was an honor presented at the Grammy Awards, a ceremony that was established in 1958 and originally called the Gramophone Awards, to quality country music collaborations for artists who do ...

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Best Country Song The Grammy Award for Best Country Song (sometimes known as the Country Songwriter's Award) has been awarded since 1965. The award is given to the songwriter(s) of the song, not to the artist, unless the artist is also the songwriter. There have ...

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Best Female Country Vocal Performance The Grammy Award for Best Female Country Vocal Performance was first awarded in 1965, to Dottie West Dottie West (born Dorothy Marie Marsh; October 11, 1932 – September 4, 1991) was an American country singer and songwriter. She also had s ...

Best-of lists

Track listing

Personnel

*Loretta Lynn -

lead vocals The lead vocalist in popular music is typically the member of a group or band whose voice is the most prominent melody in a performance where multiple voices may be heard. The lead singer sets their voice against the accompaniment parts of the ...

acoustic guitar An acoustic guitar is a musical instrument in the string family. When a string is plucked, its vibration is transmitted from the bridge, resonating throughout the top of the guitar. It is also transmitted to the side and back of the instrument, ...

*David Feeny -

pedal steel guitar The pedal steel guitar is a console steel guitar with pedals and knee levers that change the pitch of certain strings, enabling more varied and complex music to be played than with other steel guitar designs. Like all steel guitars, it can play ...

Dobro Dobro () is an American brand of resonator guitars owned by Gibson and manufactured by its subsidiary Epiphone. The term "dobro" is also used as a generic term for any wood-bodied, single-cone resonator guitar. The Dobro was originally a gui ...

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a percussion mallet, beater including attached or enclosed beaters or Rattle (percussion beater), rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or ...

, backing vocals *

Patrick Keeler James Patrick Keeler is an American rock music drummer from Cincinnati, who is best known for playing in The Greenhornes, The Raconteurs, and The Afghan Whigs. He plays with both traditional and matched grips. Recording career Keeler has play ...

drums The drum is a member of the percussion instrument, percussion group of musical instruments. In the Hornbostel–Sachs classification system, it is a membranophones, membranophone. Drums consist of at least one Acoustic membrane, membrane, c ...

, percussion, backing vocals * "Little" Jack Lawrence -

bass guitar The bass guitar (), also known as the electric bass guitar, electric bass, or simply the bass, is the lowest-pitched member of the guitar family. It is similar in appearance and construction to an Electric guitar, electric but with a longer nec ...

, percussion, backing vocals * Dan John Miller - acoustic guitar, percussion, backing vocals *

Dirk Powell Overview Dirk Powell (born 1969) is an American fiddler, banjo player, and singer. He was born in Oberlin southwest of Elyria, Ohio into a family with deep Kentucky roots. He has lived in Louisiana since 1992. He is considered one of the world's ...

fiddle A fiddle is a Bow (music), bowed String instrument, string musical instrument, most often a violin or a bass. It is a colloquial term for the violin, used by players in all genres, including European classical music, classical music. Althou ...

, bowed bass,

banjo The banjo is a stringed instrument with a thin membrane stretched over a frame or cavity to form a resonator. The membrane is typically circular, and in modern forms is usually made of plastic, where early membranes were made of animal skin. ...

electric guitar An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external electric Guitar amplifier, sound amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar. It uses one or more pickup (music technology), pickups ...

, acoustic guitar,

organ Organ and organs may refer to: Biology * Organ (biology), a group of tissues organized to serve a common function * Organ system, a collection of organs that function together to carry out specific functions within the body. Musical instruments ...

piano A piano is a keyboard instrument that produces sound when its keys are depressed, activating an Action (music), action mechanism where hammers strike String (music), strings. Modern pianos have a row of 88 black and white keys, tuned to a c ...

, percussion, backing vocals, duet vocals on "Portland Oregon" ;Technical *Brendan Benson - engineer *Eric McConnell - engineer *

Stuart Sikes Stuart Sikes is an American recording engineer and producer best known for his work with the White Stripes and for engineering Loretta Lynn's Grammy Award-winning album '' Van Lear Rose'', as well as producing Cat Power's 2006 Shortlist Music Priz ...

- mixing *Russ Harrington - photography

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

References

External links

* {{Authority control 2004 albums Interscope Records albums Loretta Lynn albums Albums produced by Jack White Third Man Records albums Grammy Award for Best Country Album