Chart Chat 12/2/09: Boyle Burns Up the Charts!
Written by: Money Mike
Ladies and gentlemen, the highest first-week total for an album in 2009 is now owned by…Susan Boyle?
Yep, she first wowed ‘em on “Britain’s Got Talent”, and now a frumpy, middle-aged Brit has scored a first week better than Eminem, 50, Jay-Z, Britney, John Mayer and even the King of Pop’s last albums. “I Dreamed a Dream” starts with an amazing 701,000 units. It also broke records in Boyle’s native country, where it had the biggest-selling debut week in HISTORY.
Add in a #2 finish for Andrea Bocelli’s Christmas album and it’s fairly obvious to see who comprises the record-buying public these days. Expect these two albums to be the top sellers of the holiday season.
It’s hard to say whether Adam Lambert’s outrageous awards show appearance helped or hurt his sales. His “For Your Entertainment” bows at #3 this week with sales of 198,000 copies. For the sake of reference, last year’s second place finisher, David Archuleta, opened with 183K, and it’s fair to say Lambert’s gotten much more of a promotional push than Archie did. All things considered, I’d say those numbers are probably something of a disappointment.
Other debuts this week: Rihanna pops in at #4 with a so-so 181K (to be truthful, none of her albums has had especially strong first week sales, though), while Lady GaGa’s 8-track “Fame: Monster” EP crashes onto the charts with 174,000 sold. Right behind it? Lady GaGa’s original “Fame” LP, which has been repackaged with the additional tracks from “Monster”. That scanned 151,000 copies, making it the week’s biggest gainer.
The week’s biggest disappointment has to be Shakira’s “She Wolf”. Coming off of the wildly succesful “Oral Fixation” album and the hit “Hips Don’t Lie”, PLUS an “SNL” performance and a Rolling Stone cover, I’m sure the album was expected to do better than a #15 finish and 89,000 copies sold.
The American Music Awards, as expected, were a big catalyst for some of the chart jumps this week. Five-time winner Taylor Swift jumps 24% in scans this week to sell another 125K and inch closer to the 5 million sold mark on “Fearless” (she might reach it before the end of the year), while Michael Jackson’s “This is It” soundtrack jumps 13% to 108,000 sold this week, putting it a week or so away from a million sales.
John Mayer takes a bit of a tumble, as “Battle Studies” falls from 1-13 with just over 92K sold, bringing it’s two week total to a not-bad 400,000 copies. Still, that drop has got to be alarming, as was Bon Jovi’s 1-19 fall last week. However, that’s not the biggest chart drop in history. Incubus’s last album, “Light Grenades” freefell 1-37 in it’s second week out. And it still wound up selling 800,000 copies. So, a large drop isn’t necessarily a death knell.
Altogether a nice Thanksgiving week. 12 albums sold more than 100,000 copies, giving us a taste of the good old days. Sales should drop sharply for all titles next week, as relatively normal buying habits resume. Boyle should retain her #1 title, with albums from Allison Iraheta and R. Kelly bowing in the Top Ten.
Here’s this week’s Top 20 albums:
1) Susan Boyle “I Dreamed a Dream”
2) Andrea Bocelli “My Christmas”
3) Adam Lambert “For Your Entertainment”
4) Rihanna “Rated R”
5) Lady GaGa “The Fame Monster (EP)”
6) Lady GaGa “The Fame”
7) Miley Cyrus “Time of Our Lives (EP)”
Taylor Swift “Fearless”
9) Carrie Underwood “Play On”
10) Norah Jones “The Fall”
11) Michael Jackson “This is It”
12) Various Artists “Twilight: New Moon Soundtrack”
13) John Mayer “Battle Studies”
14) Justin Bieber “My World”
15) Shakira “She Wolf”
16) Various Artists “Now 32″
17) Casting Crowns “Peace on Earth”
18) Michael Buble “Crazy Love”
19) Glee Cast “Glee-the Music Vol. 1″
20) 50 Cent “Before I Self Destruct”
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I loved this quote, which in my opinion is BS.
From Popeater: http://www.popeater.com/2009/12/02/susan-boyle-album-sales/
“Columbia chairman Steve Barnett told the New York Times that only about 39,000 of Ms. Boyle’s total in the United States were sold through iTunes. Consumers could also purchase the album on shopping network QVC.
“The reason that this record really did what it did,” Mr. Barnett told the Times, “was that people wanted to get it and own it, to feel like they’re a part of it.”
Um, how about her demo which is older still buys CDs? They don’t want to feel a part of it, they don’t know any way else to buy albums.
But kudos to Susan and all of the folks that marketed her correctly. What a debut. I wonder what kind of legs it has.
Disagree. Everyone with a pulse knows what iTunes is. The average working 50 year old man or woman realizes they have a choice as to whether to buy digital or traditional retail, and *prefers* to buy CDs.
I have 70 new/used/swapped CDs in the last 3 months. I ain’t giving up CDs, and I have as much music technology as any non-working musician around. I ain’t giving up my vinyl either, including the several hundred 45s I still own.
But I also have download only tracks.
Lots of reasons for Boomers clinging to physical music, but one is the amazing feeling of opening an LP with its $4.99 sticker, running your hand over the front and back, reading all of the liner notes, being disappointed that the sleeve was plain, looking at the LP label and seeing if there were messages…
BTW, I was talking with CJ. Do you guys realize that from 78s, to reel-to-reel, to mono and stereo LPs, to cassette to CD, we constantly improved sound quality in the basic music unit? Then with the advent of digital, we kept a copy that didn’t degrade, but dropped sound quality.