kylie minogue
Pop superstar Kylie Minogue says she made a “conscious decision to go for it” in terms of promoting her new album Tension – and indeed she has. Since mid-May, she’s been hard at work across the globe to tell the tale of Tension.
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“The entire team’s been working really hard,” she tells the Billboard Pop Shop Podcast (listen to her full interview, below). “I feel so grateful for this moment and so excited for the music and what is unfolding — people’s experience with the music and how they’re making it their own and really welcoming it into their lives, that how could I not give extra? I mean it’s kind of my default anyways.”
All that hard work paid off too. Tension debuted at No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Dance/Electronic Albums chart, scored her biggest sales week in the U.S. in early 20 years, and opened at No. 1 in the U.K. and in Australia.
Now that she’s broken the Tension, next up for Minogue is the launch of her residency at the Voltaire Belle de Nuit at the Venetian Resort in Las Vegas, which begins on Nov. 3. The intimate club, which will hold only 1,000 guests at each show, promises to offer a unique experience with Minogue, which the Voltaire advertises as “more than just a residency.”
Minogue says her performance within the club will feature a “selection of songs from throughout the years” and that the show, and its setlist, could evolve over time, since she has 20 shows currently scheduled “over a number of months,” on through next May.
Guests attending an evening at the Voltaire during Minogue’s residency will see their evening start around 9:30 p.m., while Minogue will take the stage a little after 11. “It’s late night,” she says. Will her Voltaire performance differ from a traditional touring show from Minogue? “It will be different to a normal concert,” she says. “My show’s normally two [hours], two [hours] and 15 [minutes long] … so it’s gonna be more snug [than a regular show]. I think it’s gonna feel, because we’re so close [she and the audience] … to be revealed. I mean, I haven’t done this kind of show before. But I think being that close and that intimate in that environment, I think it’s gonna feel kind of more than what it might appear on paper.”
Will her Voltaire residency preclude Minogue from going out on the road with her own tour? No! Does she have a desire to head back out for her own traveling show? Yes!
“I see [the Voltaire engagement] as a very specific show and experience, enhanced by and limited by its surrounds. It is a performance within the Voltaire club. And, to be this involved at the inception of this club — which will hopefully be there for many, many years with lots of different artists performing there — I do feel especially attached to it because I’ve known about it since its inception and I’m part of the opening. But, my tour? That would be different again. And a very different sensation for me and for the audience. So yeah, I would love to go on tour again, absolutely.”
Also in our chat with Minogue, the pop princess reveals how she “would love to be back in the studio” working on new music after the inspiring time she had making the Tension album. “I feel like we’ve just kind of tapped into something that I’d love to explore more.”
Also on the new edition of the Pop Shop Podcast, we’ve got chart news how *NSYNC returns to the Billboard Hot 100 for the first time in 20 years and makes a splashy entrance on Billboard’s airplay charts with “Better Place,” Pop Shop hosts Katie and Keith discuss their recent concert trips to see P!nk and Jessie Ware, respectively, and a chart stat of the week about Madonna’s debut on the Hot 100, 40 years ago this month.
The Billboard Pop Shop Podcast is your one-stop shop for all things pop on Billboard‘s weekly charts. You can always count on a lively discussion about the latest pop news, fun chart stats and stories, new music, and guest interviews with music stars and folks from the world of pop. Casual pop fans and chart junkies can hear Billboard‘s executive digital director, West Coast, Katie Atkinson and Billboard’s managing director, charts and data operations, Keith Caulfield every week on the podcast, which can be streamed on Billboard.com or downloaded in Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast provider. (Click here to listen to the previous edition of the show on Billboard.com.)
Kylie Minogue collects her second No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Dance/Electronic Albums chart as her new studio release Tension opens atop the tally (dated Oct. 7). She previously led the 22-year-old list with 2020’s Disco.
The new album’s chart-topping debut comes after its lead single, “Padam Padam,” became a viral hit over the summer, and went on to become her first top 10 hit on the 10-year-old Hot Dance/Electronic Songs chart in June.
Tension, released Sept. 22 via Darenote/BMG, earned 24,500 equivalent album units in the U.S. in the week ending Sept. 28, according to Luminate. That marks Minogue’s best week, by units, since the industry began measuring by that metric in December 2014. On the all-genre Billboard 200 chart, Tension debuts at No. 21, her highest-charting album in over a decade, since Aphrodite hit No. 19 (July 24, 2010-dated chart).
Further, of Tension’s first-week units, album sales comprise 19,500 – the pop star’s biggest sales week for an album in nearly 20 years. She last sold more in a single week with an album when Body Language debuted with 43,500 (Feb. 28, 2004-dated chart). Of Tension’s 19,500 sold, physical sales comprise nearly 14,000 (7,000 on vinyl – her biggest week on vinyl since Luminate began tracking music sales in 1991; 6,000 on CD and 1,000 on cassette) and digital album sales comprise about 5,500.
Tension was issued as a standard 11-song album, a 14-track deluxe edition (on CD, digital download and streamers) and in a 16-song edition (sold as a digital download exclusively through Minogue’s webstore). Sales of the album were bolstered by more than 15 physical formats, including seven vinyl variants (all with the same standard 11-song tracklist, with many in different colors with alternative covers – including some retailer-exclusive offerings), five cassettes (four with the album’s standard tracklist, and one with the 14-song tracklist – all in different colors) and five CDs (including a signed edition sold through Newbury Comics, and versions in alternative collectible packaging).
Tension was ushered in by the No. 7-peaking “Padam Padam” on Hot Dance/Electronic Songs in June. (The chart ranks the week’s most popular songs of the genre in the U.S., by blending streams, sales and airplay.) The track also became her first entry on the Dance/Electronic Streaming Songs chart (peaking at No. 14) and spent three weeks at No. 1 on the Dance/Electronic Digital Song Sales chart and two weeks atop the Dance/Mix Show Airplay chart.
The viral hit went on to earn 34.19 million on-demand official audio and video streams in the U.S. – making it Minogue’s third-biggest streaming song ever in America. “Can’t Get You Out of My Head,” released in 2001, is her most-streamed hit in the U.S. (176.66 million) and her seasonal cover of “Santa Baby,” released in 2000, is in second place (44.62 million). (Minogue made her Billboard chart debut in May of 1988, bowing on the Billboard Hot 100 with “I Should Be So Lucky.”)
Following “Padam,” the new album has spun off a second dance hit with the title track, which hit No. 18 on Hot Dance/Electronic Songs in September, No. 1 on Dance/Electronic Digital Song Sales and debuts at No. 7 on Dance/Mix Show Airplay on the Oct. 7-dated chart. Plus, concurrent with the album’s debut on the charts, the set’s “Hold On to Now” bows at No. 32 on Hot Dance/Electronic Songs and No. 10 on Dance/Electronic Song Sales.
Outside of the dance world, “Padam Padam” gave Minogue her first entry on the Pop Airplay chart since 2004’s “Slow,” and her first hit on the Adult Pop Airplay chart since 2002’s “Can’t Get You Out of My Head.”
The Billboard 200 and Top Dance/Electronic Albums charts rank, respectively, the week’s most popular overall albums, and dance/electronic albums, 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. Top Album Sales ranks the week’s top-selling albums by traditional album sales (CD, vinyl, cassette, digital download album, etc.).
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