Laufey Logs Biggest Jazz Debut in Nearly Two Years With ‘Bewitched’
Written by djfrosty on September 20, 2023
Rising jazz artist Laufey scores her first entry on the Billboard 200 albums chart with her sophomore release Bewitched, debuting at No. 23 on the Sept. 23-dated list. Further, the set launches atop both the Traditional Jazz Albums and overall Jazz Albums charts – marking the first No. 1 on both rankings for the 24-year-old Icelandic singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist (real name: Laufey Lin Jónsdóttir).
In addition, with 23,000 equivalent album units earned in the U.S. in the week ending Sept. 14, Bewitched also snares the largest debut week for a jazz album in nearly two years – since Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga’s Love for Sale started with 41,000 on the Oct. 16, 2021-dated charts. Notably, 68% of Bewitched’s first-week activity was driven by streaming (with the set’s 14 songs collecting 22.36 million on-demand official streams).
Previous to the release of Bewitched, Laufey amassed a sizable following on TikTok (nearly 3 million followers) and collected 339 million on-demand official song streams in the U.S.
Laufey notched one previous entry on both the Traditional Jazz Albums and Jazz Albums charts, with the Typical of Me EP, peaking at No. 2 on both rankings (Sept. 2-dated lists).
The Billboard 200 chart ranks the most popular albums of the week in the U.S. based on multi-metric consumption as measured in equivalent album units. Units comprise album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA). Each unit equals one album sale, or 10 individual tracks sold from an album, or 3,750 ad-supported or 1,250 paid/subscription on-demand official audio and video streams generated by songs from an album. The Traditional Jazz Albums and Jazz Albums charts rank the most popular traditional and overall jazz albums of the week by equivalent album units. (The Jazz Albums chart is inclusive of all styles of jazz, including both traditional and contemporary jazz titles.)