Album Sales Were Already Booming Last Week Even Before Adele
The Week In Pop will not run this week due to Thanksgiving, so let’s check in on this week’s chart action before the holiday is upon us. Last week was one of the busiest album sales weeks in recent memory, and that’s even before Adele’s presumptive record-smasher 25 was on sale.
Topping the bill, Justin Bieber’s Purpose and One Direction’s Made In The A.M. were expected to square off for #1, and while both releases racked up some of the most gargantuan sales figures of the year, in the end it wasn’t even close. Billboard reports that Bieber accumulated 679,000 equivalent units (522,000 in pure sales). That beats Drake’s If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late to achieve the best opening sales week of the year — a fleeting distinction considering Adele has already sold more than triple those numbers.
One Direction, meanwhile, moved 459,000 units (402,000 in pure sales), marking the first time two albums sold more than 400,000 in a single week since 2009, when Susan Boyle’s I Dreamed A Dream and Alicia Keys’ The Element Of Freedom did it. It’s the first time two albums have debuted with such huge numbers since the fabled Kanye West/50 Cent sales battle of 2007.
Last week was also only the fourth time in the history of the Billboard 200 that eight albums debuted in the top 10. Here are the other six: Logic’s The Incredible True Story (#3), Jeezy’s Church In These Streets (#4), Chris Young’s I’m Comin’ Over (#5), Trans-Siberian Orchestra’s Letters From The Labyrinth (No. 7), Alessia Cara’s Know-It-All (#9) and Kirk Franklin’s Losing My Religion (#10).
Bieber also made big moves on the Hot 100 singles chart, joining the Beatles and 50 Cent to become the third artist to log three simultaneous top-5 singles. Between #2 “Sorry” and #5 “What Do You Mean?” sits the Ed Sheeran co-write “Love Yourself,” which debuts at #4. Per Billboard, Bieber also has a record 17 simultaneous songs in the top 100, far surpassing the Beatles and Drake’s prior record of 14. Elsewhere in the top 10, Adele’s “Hello” holds strong at #1, Drake’s “Hotline Bling” is hanging in there at #3, and Alessia Cara’s “Here” climbs to #10.