Weekly Music Sales Report – 31 August 2011
The operatove word this week is “flat.” Sales are flat from last week, flat from the same week in 2010 and flat compared to year-to-year pacing. I could give you a bunch of other statistics, but they all equal the same thing: flat.
And with a dearth/drought of big-name and hot new releases this summer, there’s been little to get excited about. Maybe that will change with next Wednesday when we get first-week numbers for the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ I’m With You. Or maybe not.
Guess what’s back on top in Canada? Yep, Adele’s 21, which saw an 8% in sales, moving another 17,000 units. This pushed her Canadian sales close to 500,000 copies. And consider this: during the album’s 27-week run on the Canadian charts, it has never–never–charted lower than #2. Astounding.
The biggest debut this week is The RED Album from The Game, selling about 10,000 copies. Fans of Babs Streisand pushed her new album to a #11 debut with 3,600 copies. And if you were concerned about where the Muppets album would finished, it pulled in at #16, moving 2,300 units.
In the Canadian digital world, it’s still “Moves Like Jagger” from Maroon 5 on top. It movied 32,500 downloads, which was a +13% bump from last week, making it the best week for a single song since Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way” back in March.
It’s a different story in the US where The Game debuted at #1 but with just 98,000 copies. Jay-Z and Kanye slip to #2 (94,000) and Adele continues her pace of selling 80,000 records +/- 5,000.
Digitally, it’s Maroon 5 in America with 217,000 downloads of “Moves Like Jagger.” Foster the People’s “Pumped Up Kicks” isn’t too far behind with 190,000 downloads.
Things should start to get a little more interesting starting next week when we get first-week numbers from the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Lenny Kravits and Tom Morello’s The Nightwatchmen.
Meanwhile, here’s a good site to help you plan your music purchases between now and the end of the year. And for more new release info, subscribe to The Tuesday Guide.
Sales numbers courtesy of Nielsen SoundScan.
As an independent artist, I GREATLY appreciate you posting the sales info as it lets me know what I'm up against sales-wise in order to hit the charts.
It's also an eye-opener to see just how low some of the numbers are. Which is both good for my ego (based on my own sales) and bad for my aspirations of become rich on sales of my music alone.
But still…thanks!