Artist · chart history
American Authors
Band Boston United States Formed 2006
American Authors formed in 2006 in Boston, United States. American Authors has 5 chart appearances on 5 radio countdowns from 5 stations on RockLists, spanning 2013–2025. The most successful song on radio countdowns is “Best Day Of My Life”, which appears on 4 lists with a best position of #4. The station that charted American Authors most often is 92.3 WTTS (Indianapolis-Bloomington, IN), with 1 appearance. The artist’s biggest year on year-end countdowns was 2014.
American Authors started out in Boston in 2006 under another name, the Blue Pages, and by 2013 they had moved their base to New York and were pushing "Best Day of My Life" and "Believer" out into the world, on a self-titled EP and on their debut album, Oh, What a Life. Those two songs are still the ones people know them by.
The lineup is Zac Barnett singing lead and playing guitar, Dave Rublin on bass and Matt Sanchez on drums, with James Adam Shelley, now a former member, adding guitar, banjo and mandolin. That last detail matters: this is alt-rock with its sleeves rolled up and a string band's toolkit on hand, built for singalongs and cheerfully unashamed of a chorus you can shout on the first listen.
The second album, What We Live For, brought another hit in "Go Big or Go Home", which cracked the top 20. These days the band has stepped away from the major-label machine and puts its music out on its own terms.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
Songs by American Authors on radio countdowns
| # | Song | Strength | Lists | Best | #1s | Peak year |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Best Day Of My Life | 4 | #4 | – | 2014 | |
| 2 | Believer | 1 | #88 | – | 2013 |
Albums with charting songs
Where each song was first released, from MusicBrainz.
Year-end chart timeline
Combined year-end countdown points per year. Taller bars mean more songs placing higher across more stations.
Every countdown appearance
| Year | # | Song | Countdown |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 562 | Best Day Of My Life | The Colorado Sound Top 800 Mood Booster Songs |
| 2014 | 55 | Best Day Of My Life | 91X Top 91 Songs of 2014 |
| 2014 | 4 | Best Day Of My Life | WTTS Top 50 Songs of 2014 |
| 2014 | 26 | Best Day Of My Life | X96 Top 50 Songs of 2014 |
| 2013 | 88 | Believer | CD101 Top 102.5 Songs of 2013 |
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