Hunting Season

Hunting Season is the debut studio album by English recording artist Chase Elite. It was released in the United Kingdom on June 20, 2011 by Daddy's Records. The album debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart, before dropping to number five in its second week. The album has so far spent eight weeks in the UK top ten. The album's debut single, "Find My Groove" was released alongside the album and also charted at number two. The second and third singles "Don't Stop The Music" and "Crazy Little Thing" also charted top 3. The album has since been certified Diamond for sales of over 1,000,000.

The album was re-released as "Festive Season" on 19 December 2011. It was preceded by the release of "Somebody For Me" as the album's final single, and includes five other bonus original christmas songs. Upon the re-release of "Festive Season", the album became the official Christmas #1 album 2011, with sales for that week of 193,489 copies. The single also went to #1 on Chritmas week. "Hunting Season" was the 9th best selling album of 2011.

Album Info
The album was originally rumoured to feature ten tracks. Chase's close friend Ben Johnston and sister Candi were revealed early on to have written a track for the album. The tracklisting was officially revealed on 7th June 2010, 2 weeks before the albums official release, showing Kleo, Brett Clarkson, Veronica Nightshade and Chase himself to have also written tracks for the album. There are also three duets on the album, two with Kleo and one with Veronica.

Work on Chase's album first began in late March 2011, upon him starring in sister Candi's MTV series and revealing an interest in starting a music career, he was approached by many producers and writers keen to work with him, and sent a solid few months in the studio. The album was created in roughly two months, with Kleo and Candi having already written their tracks several months earlier.

Singles

 * "Find My Groove," was released June 20, 2011 on the same date as the album, acting as the lead single and Chase's debut single. The track was written by Ben Johnston.
 * "Don't Stop The Music," was the album's second single, released on August 29, 2011 and written by Chase himself. It charted at #3.
 * "Crazy Little Thing," served as the album's third single. The Brett Clarkson written single charted at #2 after being released on October 24, 2011.
 * "Somebody For Me," is the album's fourth and final single, release December 19, 2011 (Christmas week) the single was released alongside a christmas themed re-release of the album, titled "Festive Season". The single became the official UK #1 Christmas 2011, giving Chase his first ever #1 single.

Critical Response
Hunting Season received mixed reviews from critics upon its release, receiving an average score of 60 out of 100, according to music review aggregator Metacritic. The most positive of reviews coming from Los Angeles Times's August Brown who gave the album two and half stars out of four, praising the album for its "array of earnest trance-pop, glossy guitar rock and buttoned-down R&B." and called it "a pleasure-packed debut." He also went on to praise Elite's vocal ability. Allmusic's David Jeffries was less impressed and gave the album three out of five stars criticizing the album for "showcasing Chase in a mixed manner". He went on to explain that "some songs show Chase as a heartless lady killer, where as others show him as a vulnerable heartbroken man. Either way it leaves you not fully aware of who he is trying to be". Despite this Jeffries went on to praise the album for its ability to "get stuck in your head" and went on to call the album "one to admire rather than advocate". The most critical of reviews came from BBC Music's Mike Diver who criticized the album as a whole and called it a "self-centered, ego filled mashup, that Chase appears to have chosen to release instead of for his love of music, but more for his love of himself". Allmusic described the album as "a strong support to what is likely to be a bright future, however if Chase was aiming to break out of older sister Candi's shadow and become a star of his own, he still has some waiting to do." In general the song's on the album were met with a mostly positive response, particularly tracks "Crazy Little Thing", "Blind", "Somebody For Me" and "Find My Groove".

Charts
Hunting Season debuted at number two on the official albums chart behind Elice Claire's rarities album Mademoiselle which outsold Elite by only 2,000 sales. In it's second week, the album went silver and after four weeks on the chart, the album had achieved Gold status and due to Don't Stop The Music's release, the album went platinum in it's eleventh week. On the album's 27th week in the Chart, it was re-released as "Festive Season", and became the official Christmas 2011 #1 album, with enormous one week sales of 193,489. It also remained at #1 the following week, making it the first #1 album of 2012 and finally pushed the album into Diamond Certification for sales of over 1,000,000 copies.

Overall Sales: 1,155,899