Karen Waldrup’s Success is Justified!

Charismatic entertainer, innovative entrepreneur and country singer/songwriter Karen Waldrup released her full length debut album in partnership with The Fuel Music on Friday, July 13 and a week later she’s officially “justified” thanks to four Billboard charts.  Justified, the album she’s always wanted to make, landed at #26 on the Country Albums Sales chart, #44 on Independent Albums chart, #14 on Heatseekers and #7 on Heatseekers South Central.  The album, produced by Garth Fundis and completely funded by fans all over the world via an Indiegogo campaign, is an eleven song album featuring a fresh new country sound meshed with the soulful nostalgia of Waldrup’s home state of Louisiana.

Karen Waldrup Justified

I can’t believe it and I couldn’t be more thankful to my Waldrup Worldwide Family,” exclaims Waldrup.  “I always dreamed my debut album would land on the Billboard chart and I’m beyond ecstatic.”

Waldrup wrote or co-wrote 9 of the 11 tracks with Nashville friends and fellow songwriters including Julia Cole, Anthony Smith, Donnie Skaggs, Ed Hill, Brian Kolb and others.  The album features title track “Justified,” that Music Row magazine calls “a soul-rock tune that showcases potent, wailing and penetrating vocalist with moxie and fire,” the catchy party anthem “What Goes On In This Bar (Stays In This Bar),” Waldrup’s viral version of “I Hope You Dance,” the Lori McKenna penned love song “Sometimes He Does” and the vibey and sultry “Slow and Easy.”

Throwback to November 2016, Waldrup launched an Indiegogo campaign to fund a new project that award-winning producer Garth Fundis agreed to produce.  The life of the campaign was a roller coaster ride, with very low lows and even higher highs for independent artist Waldrup.  During the campaign, she heard a preacher say “the moment you take the burden off of yourself to be important is the moment you start living your true potential,” and she committed to living that mindset.  Shortly after, by request from a 16 year old fan, Waldrup recorded an unedited, one-take cover of Lee Ann Womack’s massive hit “I Hope You Dance” in her living room.  After sending it to that fan, she also shared the video with her friends at lifestyle brand Country Rebel. They were blown away by the heartfelt cover and posted it immediately on their socials.  After millions of views and thousands of interactions on social media, her Indiegogo campaign was over 100% funded and she began recording that dream album. To date, the video has been viewed over 28 million times.

Listen to Justified here. 

Check out “behind the scenes” from the album here.
Autographed copies available at www.karenwaldrup.com/store.

Track Listing:
Colorado Kiss – Julia Cole, Karen Waldrup
Nobody’s Running Away – Ed Hill, Donnie Skaggs, Karen Waldrup
Parker Presley – Parker Pressley, Karen Waldrup
Justified – Brian Kolb, Karen Waldrup
Slow & Easy – Anthony Smith, Karen Waldrup
What Goes On In This Bar (Stays In This Bar) – Ed Hill, Donnie Skaggs, Karen Waldrup
Sometimes He Does – Lori McKenna
Praying For My Cowboy – Julia Cole, Karen Waldrup
Warm In Your Sunshine – Brett Jones, Karen Waldrup
Cool Hat – Ed Hill, Donnie Skaggs, Karen Waldrup
I Hope You Dance – Tia Sellers, Mark Sanders

About Karen Waldrup 

New Orleans native Karen Waldrup is a triple threat musician, songwriter and recording artist known for her thrilling performances and nostalgically new style of country music.

Waldrup has spent the last few years touring the world performing thousands of shows everywhere from Memphis, TN to Dublin, Ireland and is now a true viral sensation with her social media videos gaining mass appeal and more than 180 million views. Waldrup is the subject of “Waldrup Wednesdays,” the hugely popular weekly video series on Country Rebel’s Facebook page.

Waldrup is currently nominated for 2 Nashville Independent Music Awards (NIMA) for Best Country Live Performer and Best Female Country Solo. In 2017, she won 3 NIMA awards for Best Live Country Performer, Best Video and Best Solo Female Country Artist and she also landed an original song in the motion picture ‘Scales: Mermaids are Real’. The video for her 2016 Summer song “I Got That Kind of Time” spent 5 weeks at #1 and 12 weeks in the top 5 on CMT. Her “Trashy Crashed the Party” video stayed in the top 3 for 5 weeks straight.

Waldrup appeared on Bravo TV’s Platinum Hit with hosts Jewel & Kara Diaguardi, and had music featured on Bravo TV’s reality series My Fab 40. She was a Nashville Rising Star finalist in 2015 and was previously named a GAC Top 25 Songwriter. Karen has been

featured on NASCAR ESPN LIVE, the NFL Experience Superbowl XLVII and hundreds of other outlets world wide.

Waldrup’s new album Justified is available everywhere now. 

About Shauna "WhiskeyChick" Castorena

Shauna "WhiskeyChick" Castorena is a freelance writer for both Country Music News and Country Music On Tour. Want to collab on some content? Email me. Want my rates for commercial promo work outside of music? Get them right here.