1989 (Taylor’s Version)
Taylor Swift’s 1989 (Taylor’s Version) rises 2-1 on the Billboard 200 albums chart (dated Dec. 30), marking the fourth nonconsecutive week atop the list for the set. It earned 136,000 equivalent album units in the U.S. in the week ending Dec. 21 (up 25%) according to Luminate. The set, along with many of Swift’s titles, continues to benefit from vinyl sales encouraged by holiday shopping and promotions.
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1989 (Taylor’s Version) spent its first two weeks at No. 1 (Nov. 11-18), had another week in the lead on the Dec. 9 chart, and then bounces back to the top on the new chart.
Swift has a total of three albums in the top 10 on the new chart, as 1989 (Taylor’s Version) is joined by former No. 1s Midnights (7-3 with 75,000 – up 31%) and Lover (9-7; 60,000 – up 22%).
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, compiled by Luminate. 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 new Dec. 30, 2023-dated chart will be posted in full on Billboard‘s website on Dec. 27, one day later than normal due to the Christmas Day holiday on Dec. 25. For all chart news, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both X, formerly known as Twitter, and Instagram.
Nicki Minaj’s Pink Friday 2 falls to No. 2 with 100,000 equivalent album units (down 56%) after debuting atop the list a week ago. Michael Bublé’s former No. 1 Christmas climbs 5-4 (70,000; up 10%), Morgan Wallen’s chart-topping One Thing at a Time bumps 6-5 (just over 64,000; up 2%), and Drake’s former leader For All the Dogs dips 3-6 (64,000; down 6%).
Nat King Cole’s The Christmas Song ascends 11-8 (56,000 equivalent album units; up 17%), SZA’s former leader SOS falls 8-9 (54,000; up 2%), and Mariah Carey’s Merry Christmas returns to the top 10 for the first time this season, rising 12-10 (52,000; up 14%). Merry peaked at No. 3 in its initial chart run, on the Dec. 17, 1994-dated chart. This is the sixth consecutive season the album has revisited the top 10.
Luminate, the independent data provider to the Billboard charts, completes a thorough review of all data submissions used in compiling the weekly chart rankings. Luminate reviews and authenticates data. In partnership with Billboard, data deemed suspicious or unverifiable is removed, using established criteria, before final chart calculations are made and published.
No matter how you Style it, Taylor Swift‘s 1989 (Taylor’s Version) is a juggernaut. The re-recorded set debuted with 1.653 million equivalent album units (EAUs) in the United States in the week ending Nov. 2, according to Luminate, making it far and away the biggest debut for an album so far in 2023. To give a sense of just how phenomenal its performance is, we’ve stacked it up against every other No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 so far this year — a list comprising 15 additional titles in all.
It bears reiterating that first-week EAUs for 1989 (Taylor’s Version) dwarfed those of all other No. 1 albums released this year, topping every other debut week by more than double. That includes her own Speak Now (Taylor’s Version), which had the second biggest debut week of the year with 716,000 EAUs in July, as well as the third-place finisher, Morgan Wallen‘s One Thing at a Time, which racked up 501,000 EAUs in its first week. Swift’s top-two placement on the list is a remarkable feat, underlining the fact that in some ways, the megastar’s only real competition these days is herself.
Case in point: In its first week, 1989 (Taylor’s Version)‘s 1.359 million in traditional album sales — a metric that encompasses physical sales (vinyl, CD, cassette) and digital downloads — quickly surpassed 2023’s previous best-seller, Swift’s own Midnights, which dropped in October 2022 and had racked up 791,000 in sales so far this year. Swift also has the third most-sold album of the year with Speak Now (Taylor’s Version), which has racked up sales of 755,000 since its July release. All three got to those numbers due to Swift’s strategy of offering multiple collectible physical formats; in the case of 1989 (Taylor Version), that includes five color vinyl variants, eight CD editions and two cassette editions — not to mention two digital download editions (standard and deluxe).
The strategy of offering multiple physical variants is one that’s also successfully employed by many of today’s top K-pop acts, including three who enjoyed No. 1 albums on the Billboard 200 this year: TOMORROW X TOGETHER, Stray Kids and NewJeans. As a result, like Swift, the majority of those acts’ first-week EAUs consist of traditional album sales. The first-week sales of 1989 (Taylor’s Version) comprise a whopping 82.2% of total EAUs — more than any other No. 1 debut album this year aside from TOMORROW X TOGETHER’s The Name Chapter: Temptation EP (94.41%) and Stray Kids’ 5-Star (94.38%). NewJeans’ Get Up EP had nearly as high of a sales percentage at 80.6%. The only other non-K-pop act to boast a similar first-week sales-to-streams ratio was blink-182‘s One More Time…, whose first-week sales made up 81% of total EAUs thanks to the band’s offering of 11 vinyl variants, as well as a CD, cassette and deluxe boxed set.
In fact, the first-week sales of 1989 (Taylor’s Version) were larger than the next five biggest first-week sales tallies of 2023 combined: Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) (507,000), Travis Scott’s Utopia (252,000), Stray Kids’ 5-Star (235,000), TOMORROW X TOGETHER’s The Name Chapter: Temptation EP (152,000) and Olivia Rodrigo’s Guts (150,000).
Unlike these top-selling K-pop acts, whose first-week streaming units tend to hover in the low-five-digit range, Swift’s streaming game stacks up well against the heaviest hitters on that metric. 1989 (Taylor’s Version) racked up 294,000 streaming units in its first week, third only to Drake’s For All the Dogs and Wallen’s One Thing at a Time, which drew 392,000 and 390,000 streaming units, respectively.
Kelly Clarkson knows all too well how sweet Taylor Swift is.
The superstar revealed to E! News that the “Anti-Hero” superstar sends her gifts after album releases. “You know what’s so funny? She just sent me flowers,” The Kelly Clarkson Show host shared. “She’s so nice. She did. She was like, ‘Every time I release something’—’cause she just did 1989. I got that really cute cardigan, too.”
Clarkson also maintained that Swift would have come up with the idea of her re-recordings on her own, despite the American Idol alum taking to Twitter back in 2019 amid Swift’s battle over masters with Scooter Braun to make the suggestion. “@taylorswift13 just a thought, U should go in & re-record all the songs that U don’t own the masters on exactly how U did them but put brand new art & some kind of incentive so fans will no longer buy the old versions,” she wrote at the time.
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“I love how kind she is though,” Kelly told E! News. “She’s a very smart businesswoman. So, she would have thought of that. But it just sucks when you see artists that you admire and you respect really wanting something and it’s special to them. You know if they’re going to find a loophole, you find a loophole. And she did it and literally is, like, the best-selling artist I feel like of all-time now.”
She added of the Swifties, “It’s so cool to see a fanbase really get behind her in that too because it’s important. She’s known for being such an incredible songwriter and the soundtrack to a lot of people’s lives and that’s her life. So, you should have the option of owning that.”
Following the release of 1989 (Taylor’s Version) last month, Swift earned the biggest sales week of her career, earning 1.653 million equivalent album units in its debut week, scoring her 13th No. 1 on the Billboard 200; that’s the biggest equivalent album units total for an album since Adele’s 25 in 2015, and also marks Swift’s largest sales week (1.359 million) to date.
Meanwhile, “Is It Over Now? (Taylor’s Version),” one of five “From the Vault” tracks from the album, debuts at No. 1 on this week’s Hot 100 chart, giving Swift her 11th career chart-topper.
Taylor Swift is the queen of vinyl, as the superstar is by far the top-selling artist in 2023 in the U.S. when it comes to vinyl albums sold. So far this year, through Nov. 2, her catalog of albums have sold 2.484 million copies on vinyl in 2023, according to data tracking firm Luminate. That equates to 6.43% of total vinyl album sales (38.585 million) — or, nearly one out of every 15 vinyl albums sold.
A healthy chunk of Swift’s vinyl sales this year come from her latest release, 1989 (Taylor’s Version), which debuted with 693,000 copies sold in the U.S. in the week ending Nov. 2, following its Oct. 27 release. That sum also broke the record for the single largest sales week for an album on vinyl since Luminate began tracking music sales in 1991. It surpassed the high-water mark previously set by Swift herself, with the debut week of Midnights in 2022, with 575,000 copies sold.
Swift’s impressive vinyl sales figures are bolstered by her catalog generally being made available in multiple collectible variants, including five different versions of 1989 (Taylor’s Version) – each in a different color vinyl with a different cover. (It’s not uncommon for artists to release multiple versions of an album on vinyl — Swift is not alone in this practice.)
2023’s second-biggest-selling artist when it comes to vinyl albums is Lana Del Rey, with 501,000 sold across her assorted albums.
In 2022 and 2021, Swift was the year’s top-selling vinyl albums artist in the U.S. In 2022, she sold 1.69 million (of the market’s total 43.46 million) and in 2021 she sold 1.093 million (of the market’s total of 41.717 million). In total, from January 2021 through Nov. 2, 2023, there were 123.762 million vinyl albums sold. Of that sum, Swift sold 5.273 million vinyl albums – equaling 4.26% of the vinyl market.
So far in 2023, Swift has five of the top 10 biggest-selling albums on vinyl, with four of those among the top five. Her latest release, 1989 (Taylor’s Version), is the year’s biggest on vinyl, with, as noted above, 693,000 sold in its first week. At Nos. 2, 3 and 5, respectively, are Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) (406,000), Midnights (367,000) and Folklore (201,000). Lover is Swift’s fifth title among the year’s top 10-sellers, at No. 9 with 151,000 sold.
Upon its Oct. 27 release, Taylor Swift’s 1989 (Taylor’s Version) quickly eroded both sales and streams of the original 2014 version released by Big Machine Records.
In the week Swift released her album of 1989 re-recordings, the original 1989 had 21,000 album equivalent units (AEUs) — down 43.6% from the previous week and down 36.9% from the trailing 12-week average, according to Billboard analysis of Luminate data for the United States. That was a deeper first-week decline than the previous two times Swift released re-recordings. The original Red lost 38% of its AEUs — a metric that combines physical and digital album sales, track sales and streams — the week Red (Taylor’s Version) was released in November 2021. The original Speak Now dropped 40% the week that Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) came out this past July.
On-demand audio streams for the original 1989 declined 56.4% while track sales — a smaller component of 1989’s total consumption — fell 67.8%. Video streams declined 56.4% and programmed streams (from non-interactive internet radio services such as Pandora) dropped 23.6%. At the same time, 1989 (Taylor’s Version) amassed over 375.49 million on-demand streams — compared with just 27.8 million total on-demand streams for the original over the same period.
The Taylor’s Version series of re-recordings stemmed from Swift’s outrage that her catalog had been acquired by Scooter Braun’s Ithaca Holdings in 2019. News that Braun took ownership of her catalog brought her back to “the incessant, manipulative bullying I’ve received at [Braun’s] hands for years,” she wrote at the time. “Now Scooter has stripped me of my life’s work, that I wasn’t given an opportunity to buy,” she continued. By the end of that year, Swift was talking about recording new versions so her music “could live on,” she told Billboard in a December 2019 interview. “I do want it to be in movies, I do want it to be in commercials. But I only want that if I own it.”
Swift released her first album of re-recordings, for the 2008 album Fearless, in April 2021, and licensed the lead-off single, “Love Story,” to a Match.com television ad. The track debuted at No. 1 on the Hot Country Songs chart and No. 11 on the Hot 100 in February 2021. Fearless (Taylor’s Version) debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 albums chart with 291,000 AEUs.
With each new Taylor’s Version, Swift changes the playbook on how an artist can repackage previously released material for a growing legion of diehard fans. While it’s remarkable that Swift’s album releases have become pop culture moments unto themselves, each new wave of re-recordings carries large business and financial implications, too. If 1989 (Taylor’s Version) performs like its predecessors, the re-recordings will crowd out the original version and further erode the value of the Big Machine original catalog that Shamrock Holdings paid a reported $300 million to acquire in 2020.
Surprisingly, while Swift collectors scooped up 1.36 million units of the 1989 (Taylor’s Version) album — it has five versions on vinyl, eight versions on CD and two versions on cassette — consumers still purchased about 1,000 units of the 1989 album in physical or digital formats during the same period.
Expect more of the same in the coming weeks. If 1989 (Taylor’s Version) follows the trends of the two most recent Taylor’s Version albums that came before it, the original 1989 will lose close to half or more than half of its weekly AEUs. Average weekly consumption of the original Red dropped 40% in the 12 weeks following the release of Red (Taylor’s Version). The original Speak Now lost 59% of its average weekly consumption in the 12 weeks after its counterpart was released.
The lone bright spot for the original 1989 was radio: U.S. airplay spins from the original recordings jumped 57.4% last week. Combined with airplay of the Taylor’s Version recordings, U.S. spins rose an astounding 157.4%. The catch, however, is that recordings do not earn royalties from broadcast radio performances in the United States. As a result, the original recordings’ owner, Shamrock Holdings, benefits only from the promotional value of those radio spins. Swift, however — along with various co-writers and publishing companies — earns publishing royalties when either version of 1989 recordings are played at radio.
Taylor Swift’s 1989 (Taylor’s Version) debuts at No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Album Sales chart (dated Nov. 11), selling a whopping 1.359 million copies in the U.S. in the week ending Nov. 2, according to Luminate. As previously reported, that marks the biggest sales week of 2023, the largest sales week of any album since 2015, and the sixth-biggest sales week for an album since Luminate began electronically tracking sales in 1991.
1989 (Taylor’s Version) is Swift’s 13th No. 1 on Top Album Sales.
The first-week sales of 1989 (Taylor’s Version) were so large, they accounted for 43.8% of all albums sold in the U.S. in the tracking week: 1.359 million of the total 3.102 million sold. Further, focusing just on the physical copies of the album Swift sold (CD, vinyl and cassettes), 1989 (Taylor’s Version) sold 1.261 million copies – representing 46.9% of all physical album sales last week (2.689 million physical albums were sold across all titles in the U.S.).
The sales of 1989 (Taylor’s Version) were enhanced by its availability in 15 collectible physical formats: five color vinyl variants, eight CD editions and two cassette editions. Of the five vinyl variants, Target carries a color variant that includes one bonus track (“Sweeter Than Fiction”). The album is also available to buy in two digital download editions: a standard 21-song version and a deluxe 22-song version (which adds a re-recorded version of the album’s “Bad Blood,” featuring Kendrick Lamar).
So far in 2023, Swift’s catalog of albums, across all of her titles, have sold 4.531 million copies – which accounts for 5.4% of all albums sold this year by all artists combined (83.758 million sold year to date). Swift is by far the year’s top-selling act by total album sales. Her collected albums have sold six times more than the year’s No. 2-selling act, Stray Kids, with 753,000 sold.
Elsewhere in the top 10 of the new Top Album Sales chart, the latest releases from SEVENTEEN, Grateful Dead and Duran Duran debut.
Billboard’s Top Album Sales chart ranks the top-selling albums of the week based only on traditional album sales. The chart’s history dates back to May 25, 1991, the first week Billboard began tabulating charts with electronically monitored piece count information from SoundScan, now Luminate. Pure album sales were the sole measurement utilized by the Billboard 200 albums chart through the list dated Dec. 6, 2014, after which that chart switched to a methodology that blends album sales with track equivalent album units and streaming equivalent album units. The new Nov. 11, 2023-dated chart will be posted in full on Billboard‘s website on Nov. 7. For all chart news, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both Twitter and Instagram.
At No. 2 on Top Album Sales, SEVENTEEN’s SEVENTEENTH Heaven: 11th Mini Album arrives. It’s the sixth top 10-charting effort for the Korean pop group. The set bows with 98,000 copies sold, effectively all from CD sales, bolstered by its availability across 16 collectible CD variants.
The Rolling Stones’ Hackney Diamonds falls 2-3 in its second week, with 33,000 sold (down 65%).
Grateful Dead’s latest archival live album release, Dave’s Picks, Volume 48: Pauley Pavilion, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA, 11/20/71, debuts at No. 4 with 19,000 sold. It’s the 38th top 10-charting set for the band since Top Album Sales launched in 1991.
TOMORROW X TOGETHER’s chart-topping The Name Chapter: Freefall dips 3-5 with 15,000 sold (down 48%).
Duran Duran’s new Danse Macabre debuts at No. 6 with 14,000 sold. It’s the fourth top 10-charting title on the 32-year-old Top Album Sales chart. The album’s sales were bolstered by its availability in five different vinyl iterations (adding up to a little over 5,000 sold), but its CD was its best-selling format, as its singular available CD sold nearly 6,000 copies.
Rounding out the new top 10 on Top Album Sales are four former No. 1s from Swift: Midnights (rising 8-7 with 13,000; up 48%), Lover (6-8 with 13,000; up 28%), Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) (11-9 with nearly 13,000; up 74%) and Folklore (9-10 with 12,000; up 43%). With five Swift titles in the top 10 concurrently, it’s the second time Swift held at least half of the top 10 in the same week. She previously did it on the July 22-dated chart, with six titles.
In the week ending Nov. 2, there were 3.102 million albums sold in the U.S. (up 75.5% compared to the previous week). Of that sum, physical albums (CDs, vinyl LPs, cassettes, etc.) comprised 2.689 million (up 88.9%) and digital albums comprised 413,000 (up 20%).
There were 1.233 million CD albums sold in the week ending Nov. 2 (up 105.1% week-over-week) and 1.434 vinyl albums sold (up 76.8%). Year-to-date CD album sales stand at 29.245 million (up 0.8% compared to the same time frame a year ago) and year-to-date vinyl album sales total 38.585 million (up 18.4%).
Overall year-to-date album sales total 83.758 million (up 5.7% compared to the same year-to-date time frame a year ago). Year-to-date physical album sales stand at 68.296 million (up 10.1%) and digital album sales total 15.462 million (down 10.1%).
Taylor Swift’s 1989 (Taylor’s Version) blasts in at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 albums chart (dated Nov. 11), scoring the superstar her 13th No. 1 on the chart. The set debuts with 1.653 million equivalent album units earned in the U.S. in the week ending Nov. 2, according to Luminate. That marks the largest week for any album, by units earned, since Adele’s 25 launched with 3.482 million units earned in the week ending Nov. 25, 2015.
Further, of 1989 (Taylor’s Version)’s first-week units, traditional album sales comprise 1.359 million of that sum — Swift’s single-largest sales week for any of her albums. It surpasses her previous high, logged when the original 1989 album debuted with 1.287 million sold in the week ending Nov. 2, 2014.
The first-week sales of 1989 (Taylor’s Version) are the largest for any album since Adele’s 25 bowed with 3.378 million. In total, since Luminate began electronically tracking music sales in 1991, the debut of 1989 (Taylor’s Version) marks the sixth-largest sales week for any album. The top six biggest weeks are (all in debut frames): Adele’s 25 (3.378 million), *NSYNC’s No Strings Attached (2.416 million, in 2000), *NSYNC’s Celebrity (1.878 million, 2001), Eminem’s The Marshall Mathers LP (1.76 million, 2000), Backstreet Boys’ Black & Blue (1.591 million, 2000) and 1989 (Taylor’s Version) (1.359 million).
The sales of 1989 (Taylor’s Version) were enhanced by its availability in 15 collectible physical formats: five color vinyl variants, eight CD editions and two cassette editions. Of the five vinyl variants, Target carries a color variant that includes one bonus track (“Sweeter Than Fiction”). The album is also available to buy in two digital download editions: a standard 21-song version and a deluxe 22-song version (which adds a re-recorded version of the album’s “Bad Blood,” featuring Kendrick Lamar). (Notably, Swift did not offer an autographed edition of the new album to purchase, as she did in time for the first weeks of her last three No. 1s: Speak Now [Taylor’s Version], Midnights and Red [Taylor’s Version]. Signed editions of her albums are a major sales driver.)
With Swift’s total of No. 1s on the Billboard 200 albums chart rising to 13 (Swift’s lucky number), she extends her record for the most leaders among women in the chart’s history, dating back to March of 1956, when the list began publishing on a regular, weekly basis. Among all artists, The Beatles have the most No. 1s (19), followed by Jay-Z (14) and Drake and Swift (tied with 13 each).
All 13 of Swift’s full-length studio albums and re-recorded projects from 2008’s Fearless, her second studio album, through 2023’s 1989 (Taylor’s Version) have debuted at No. 1.
Swift announced 1989 (Taylor’s Version) on Aug. 9, while performing at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, Calif., as part of her The Eras Tour. Pre-order sales for the album began shortly afterward via Swift’s official webstore.
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, compiled by Luminate. 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 new Nov. 11, 2023-dated chart will be posted in full on Billboard‘s website on Nov. 7. For all chart news, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both Twitter and Instagram.
Of 1989 (Taylor’s Version)’s 1.653 million equivalent album units earned in the week ending Nov. 2, album sales comprise 1.359 million, SEA units comprise 288,000 (equaling 375.49 million on-demand official streams of the set’s 21 songs) and TEA units comprise 6,000.
The original 1989 album debuted atop the Billboard 200 chart dated Nov. 15, 2014, and spent 11 nonconsecutive weeks at No. 1. It is tied with Swift’s first leader, Fearless, for her most weeks at No. 1 with a single album. The 1989 album boasts three songs that hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 — the most No. 1s generated from any Swift album. She sent “Shake It Off,” “Blank Space” and “Bad Blood,” featuring Kendrick Lamar, to No. 1 in 2014-15.
1989 (Taylor’s Version) includes re-recordings of the original 1989 album’s standard 13 songs plus the three tracks from its deluxe edition. The new 1989 (Taylor’s Version) adds five additional previously unreleased “From the Vault” re-recordings, bringing the total number of songs on the standard version of 1989 (Taylor’s Version) to 21.
Million-Selling Week: With 1.359 million copies sold in its first week, 1989 (Taylor’s Version) marks the sixth Swift album to have sold at least a million in a single week, following the debut weeks of Midnights, reputation, the original 1989, Red and Speak Now. She is the only act with six different albums to each sell at least 1 million copies in a single week since Luminate began electronically tracking sales in 1991.
In total, there have been 25 instances — by 23 different albums — in which an album sold at least 1 million copies in a week in the Luminate era. One of those albums, Adele’s 25, sold more than 1 million in three separate weeks.
2023’s Biggest-Selling Album: 1989 (Taylor’s Version) has already become the year’s top-selling album. It surpasses the year’s previous best-seller, Swift’s own 2022 release Midnights, which has sold 791,000 in 2023. Swift now has the top-three-selling albums of the year, as Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) is the No. 3-seller, with 755,000 sold since its release in July.
Modern-Era Single-Week Vinyl Sales Record: 1989 (Taylor’s Version) sold 693,000 copies on vinyl in its first week. That marks the largest sales week for a vinyl album since Luminate began tracking sales in 1991. Swift breaks her own modern-era vinyl sales record, set by the debut of her last studio album of all-new material, Midnights, which sold 575,000 copies in its opening week (ending Oct. 27, 2022).
Biggest Sales Week for a CD Album Since 2015: Of 1989 (Taylor’s Version)’s first-week sales across all formats (CD, vinyl, digital download and cassette), its combined eight CD editions sold 554,000 copies. That marks the single-largest sales week for an album on CD since Adele’s 25 sold 1.03 million copies on CD in its fifth week of release (week ending Dec. 24, 2015).
Swift’s Biggest Streaming Week for a Re-Recorded Album: As 1989 (Taylor’s Version) earned 288,000 SEA units, which equates to 375.49 million on-demand official streams of the set’s 21 songs, the album tallies Swift’s biggest streaming week, by total streams for its songs, for any of her four re-recorded projects. Her previous biggest streaming sum for a re-recorded project was the opening week of Red (Taylor’s Version), which saw its collected 30 songs generate 303.23 million streams. (Swift’s biggest streaming week overall for any album is the debut frame of Midnights, with 549.26 million clicks — which is also the single-largest week for any album by a woman.)
At No. 2 on the new Billboard 200, SEVENTEEN debuts with SEVENTEENTH Heaven: 11th Mini Album, marking the Korean pop group’s fourth top 10-charting effort. The set launches with 100,000 equivalent album units earned, driven almost entirely by CD sales (98,000 in total), bolstered by its availability across 16 collectible CD variants.
The rest of the top 10 comprises former No. 1s. Drake’s For All the Dogs falls 2-3 (95,000 equivalent album units earned, down 21%); Bad Bunny’s Nadie Sabe Lo Que Va a Pasar Mañana is a non-mover at No. 4 (73,000; down 25%); Morgan Wallen’s One Thing at a Time is steady at No. 5 (64,000; down 7%); Rod Wave’s Nostalgia rises 9-6 (46,000; down 9%); Swift’s Midnights dips 6-7 (45,000; down 15%); Swift’s Lover falls 7-8 (just over 44,000; down 15%); Zach Bryan’s self-titled album descends 8-9 (44,000; down 14%); and SZA’s SOS climbs 11-10 (42,000; down 5%).
Luminate, the independent data provider to the Billboard charts, completes a thorough review of all data submissions used in compiling the weekly chart rankings. Luminate reviews and authenticates data. In partnership with Billboard, data deemed suspicious or unverifiable is removed, using established criteria, before final chart calculations are made and published.
Taylor Swift is honoring her longtime friend and musical collaborator Jack Antonoff. On Sunday (Oct. 29), the pop superstar shared a heartwarming message on social media in appreciation of the Grammy-winning producer, whom she’s partnered with on numerous popular songs over the years, including 2013 track “Sweeter Than Fiction.” “There you’ll stand ten feet tall, […]
One of the most popular albums in the United States, Taylor Swift’s 1989, is about to lose significant market share to a newer version, Swift’s re-recorded 1989 (Taylor’s Version).
It’s happened three times before. 1989 (Taylor’s Version), a re-recorded and expanded version of the nine-times platinum 2014 album, with five previously unreleased tracks, follows the insanely successful formula of the three preceding albums: Fearless, Red and Speak Now. If 1989 (Taylor’s Version) enjoys the same trajectory as its predecessors, the Big Machine-era version of 1989 will lose a majority of its weekly consumption and forever get crowded out by the more popular, Swift-endorsed re-recordings.
To understand what could happen to 1989, consider its predecessor, Red. Average weekly consumption of Red — measured in equivalent album units, which combines physical and digital album sales, track sales and streams — dropped 40% in the 12 weeks following the release of Red (Taylor’s Version), according to Billboard’s analysis of Luminate data for the United States. The original version of Speak Now took an even bigger hit, losing 59% of its average weekly consumption in the 12 weeks after the re-recordings were released. Given those two trajectories, the original version of 1989 could very well lose half its average weekly consumption.
Consumption of the original 1989, which includes Hot 100 chart-toppers “Shake It Off” and “Bad Blood,” has soared this year as Swift reached a Michael Jackson-level of media coverage. As Swift Mania heated up, thanks to her record-setting Eras Tour and steady output of new and rerecorded material, 1989’s average weekly album equivalent units (AEUs) climbed from 16,000 in January to 29,000 in May to 39,000 in August, peaking at 46,000 in the week ended Aug. 17. On the latest Billboard 200 albums chart, the original 1989 ranked No. 20 — one spot behind Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) and two spots ahead of Reputation, Swift’s final album for Big Machine.
That has been great news for Shamrock Holdings, which acquired Swift’s Big Machine master recordings in 2020 for a reported $300 million. In the year before Shamrock Holdings acquired Swift’s catalog, 1989 averaged about 10,000 AEUs per week — 70% below the current level. While Swift’s previous three albums of re-recordings ate into the Big Machine originals, 1989 was spared and got to benefit from Swift’s success — that is, until she got around to releasing her Taylor’s Version.
The original version of 1989 — Swift’s best-selling album to date — has more to lose than its predecessors: 1989 has averaged 33,000 equivalent album units over the previous 12 weeks, nearly 1.8 times more consumption than the 19,000 AEUs Speak Now averaged in the 12 weeks before Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) was released. The original versions of Fearless and Red had even less consumption in the 12 weeks before Swift’s re-recordings came out: 7,000 AEUs for Fearless and 9,000 AEUs for Red.
If 1989’s weekly AEUs drop by 50%, Billboard estimates the gross sales from purchases and streams will drop by nearly $120,000 per week — equal to more than $6 million per year. That’s gross sales, not wholesale. Shamrock pockets less than wholesale after paying royalties, distribution and manufacturing.
And if 1989 (Taylor’s Version) performs like the other three albums of re-recordings, it will far outperform Swift’s Big Machine originals. Through the first 41 weeks of 2023, the re-recordings of Fearless and Red have respectively averaged 4.8 times and 4.1 times the weekly consumption of the original albums. Speak Now (Taylor’s Version), which has just 14 weeks of sales history since its July release, currently has 5.3 times the average weekly consumption of the original.
The original version of Reputation also has a lot to lose. In the past 12 weeks, Reputation has averaged 27,000 AEUs per week. And just as 1989 consumption skyrocketed this year, Reputation’s weekly AEUs have more than doubled since January. Shamrock Holdings will enjoy those spoils, too — that is, until Reputation (Taylor’s Version) inevitably arrives.
When she first announced 1989 (Taylor’s Version) back in August, Taylor Swift wrote on social media that the project was her “most FAVORITE re-record” she’s ever done because “the 5 From The Vault tracks are so insane.” “I can’t believe they were ever left behind,” she added at the time. “But not for long!” Flash […]