Despite topping the Billboard 200 with her debut album Thankful and hitting No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 with her victory single “A Moment Like This,” there was no guarantee that Kelly Clarkson‘s Breakaway – her first release outside the immediate machine of American Idol — would be a success. This was 2004, after all, and uncharted territory for an Idol winner. Plus, with season three winner Fantasia Barrino dropping her first studio effort a week earlier, would the nation be switching its attention to the latest talent show victor instead?
Although it shifted 47,000 fewer copies in its first week than Thankful, Breakaway gradually proved that Clarkson’s staying power was as strong as her vocals. The album’s blend of soulful pop, soaring power ballads and emo-tinged rock remained a fixture of the Billboard 200’s upper reaches, spawning four consecutive Hot 100 top 10 hits, more than doubling its predecessor’s sales tally in the long run (Thankful sold 2.8 million in the U.S.; Breakaway sold 6.4 million, per Luminate) and picking up two Grammys in the process. By the end of its campaign, Clarkson, who’d also co-written half of its tracks, was arguably the most successful female solo artist in America.
The star was no doubt left feeling vindicated after fighting for creative control with music industry maestro Clive Davis during the recording process. The rest of her RCA label wasn’t much more supportive, either, according to Clarkson. “I just think it’s funny that all these middle-aged guys told me, ‘You don’t know how a pop song needs to sound.’ I’m a 23-year-old girl!” she later remarked.
It’s now been two decades since Clarkson proved once and for all that she was anything but a flash in the pan. Twenty years after her sophomore album’s release on Nov. 30, 2004, here’s a ranking of its 12 tracks, from least to most essential.
