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True Believers has received positive reception from the music critics. Fred Thomas of Allmusic told that "the thing is, with a few songs you have to be listening pretty closely to differentiate the country affectations from the pop songwriting Rucker's been doing all along."[2]Music Is My Oxygen's Rob Burkhardt called the work "a set of highly sing-able, highly memorable tunes, loaded with ear-worm hooks and virtually no mis-steps."[4] At The Oakland Press, Gary Graff found that on this release that Rucker has made "something deeper than the annual ledger-satisfying exercises at which most country acts excel", which he "gets into some genuinely deep subject matter here".[5] Roughstock's Matt Bjorke affirmed that the album "feels solid and ready for the spotlight or setlist."[7] At USA Today, Brian Mansfield wrote that "Rucker sings plenty about driving, spring break and the radio".[9] Billy Dukes of Taste of Country wrote that the release "suffers from a sonic sameness that stays within Rucker’s comfort zone", and noted that "there's a whiff of formula [...] something every artist should work to stay ahead of."[8]
Commercial performance
True Believers debuted at No. 1 on the Top Country Albums chart and No. 2 on the Billboard 200, with 83,000 sold for the week.[10] This was Rucker's third top-placing studio album in a row.[11] The album was certified Gold by the RIAA on February 12, 2014.[12] As of April 2015[update], the album has sold 575,400 copies in the United States[13]
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