LANA DEL REY RECLAIMS NO.1 SPOT FOUR FOURTH WEEK WITH CHEMTRAILS OVER THE COUNTRY CLUB!
Plus: London Grammar’s Californian Soil bows at No.3; Foxes debuts at No.10 with Friends in the Corner EP.
Returning to the No.1 spot on Top Contemporary Albums, Lana Del Rey’s Chemtrails Over the Country Club captures a fourth non-consecutive week in charge.
The album sold 76,000 units this week (down 13 percent) and has now sold more than 500,000 copies to date.
Del Rey has now spent a record-tying thirty-two weeks atop L.dK Weekly: she topped the discontinued Weekly Top 50 with Lust for Life (eleven weeks) and Norman Fucking Rockwell! (a record seventeen weeks) and has now led with Chemtrails for four weeks in total.
The singer ties Taylor Swift’s thirty-two week reign across her albums Lover (one week); reputation (one week); folklore (sixteen weeks); evermore (thirteen weeks); and Fearless (Taylor’s Version) (one week).
Chemtrails dethrones Swift’s Fearless (Taylor’s Version) which drops to No.2 after debuting in pole position, selling 65,000 units (down 27 percent). Swift’s Fearless (Taylor’s Version) – a re-recording of her 2008 sophomore LP Fearless – has already been certified Gold for sales exceeding 100,000 copies.
Swift’s two previous LP’s also place within the Top Five this week. Her sixteen-week number-one folklore descends 3-4 with 33,000 sold (down 17 percent); and her thirteen-week chart-topper evermore remains at No.5 selling 31,000 units (down 9 percent).
The latter album has now surpassed Lady Gaga’s Chromatica to become the sixth bestselling album of the decade, with to-date sales of 1.96 million copies. Gaga’s former chart-topper has moved 1.91 million to date.
Swift’s other smash hit folklore is the decade’s biggest-selling release currently, with total sales of 3.25 million units.
London Grammar nab their first Top Ten album as Californian Soil vaults onto the list at No.3, registering 55,000 sales.
Celeste’s No.3-peaking debut album Not Your Muse steps up 7-6 (20,000 units – down 9 percent); The Weeknd’s The Highlights sinks 6-8 after also hitting No.3 (19,000 units – down 27 percent); and Miley Cyrus’s two-week-leader Plastic Hearts drops 8-9 (18,000 units – down 14 percent.
Foxes rounds out the Top Ten as her latest release – Friends in the Corner EP – bows at No.10 with first-week sales of 17,000 copies.
Onto Next Week: Lana Del Rey could be bound for a fourth week in the lead with Chemtrails Over the Country Club – the album is set to sell roughly 75,000 units again. Arlo Parks could also challenge for the No.2 spot with her debut set Collapsing in Sunbeams which could open with upwards of 50,000 units; it will compete with Taylor Swift’s former chart-topper Fearless (Taylor’s Version) which could also move a further 50,000 copies.
Notable Moves on Top Contemporary!
No.13 – 11 Past the Hour / Irish singer-songwriter Imelda May pays her visit to the Top Contemporary Albums Chart as her third record 11 Past the Hour launches at No.13 with first week sales of 14,000 copies.
No.23 – Positions / Ariana Grande achieves her third million-selling album this with her late-2020 number-one Positions. This week, the LP drops 18-23 in its 25th week on the ranking, selling 4,000 units. Positions has sold 1.003 million to date, making it Grande’s third release to sell a million units, following 2018’s Sweetener (1.97 million) and 2019’s thank u, next (1.31 million).
Top Contemporary Albums
Certifications: Silver (60,000) Gold (100,000) Platinum (300,000) Multi-Platinum (600,000 etc.) Diamond (3,000,000).
JONI MITCHELL EARNS RECORD-EXTENDING EIGHTH WEEK ATOP
Plus: Alanis Morissette returns to the Top Ten.
This week, Joni Mitchell crowns Top Catalogue Albums with her 1971 effort Blue, earning the record its eighth consecutive term at the summit.
Now, eight weeks into its chart life, Blue claims its greatest sales week to date, moving 76,000 units this week (up 35 percent). It beats the 75,000 copies sold in the album’s debut week.
Blue is now tied with Dua Lipa’s Future Nostalgia as the sixth longest-running number-one album of all time, with eight weeks atop L.dK Weekly. Both albums trail the fifth longest reign of all time – Lana Del Rey’s Lust for Life, which racked up an eleven week tenure (a record at the time).
Lana Del Rey: The Queen of Alternative places four records inside the Top Ten this week on Top Catalogue Albums. Seventeen-week leader Norman Fucking Rockwell! stays put at No.2 with 25,000 sold (down 4 percent); the No.2-peaking Born to Die: the Paradise Edition springs 7-5 with 14,000 sold (up 16 percent); Honeymoon rebounds 11-8 after hitting No.4 earlier this year, shifting 10,000 copies (even with last week); and the No.8 hit Ultraviolence keeps at No.9 on sales of 10,000 units (down 9 percent).
Florence + the Machine’s High as Hope rallies 5-3 in its sixteenth charting week, reaching its highest rank since the album sat at No.2 in its second week, following its No.1 start in January. The set sold 17,000 this week (up 21 percent).
Stevie Nicks’s Crystal Visions – the Very Best of Stevie Nicks backtracks 3-4 moving 17,000 copies (on par with last week) after topping the chart for a total of five weeks.
Outside the Top Five: Annie Lennox’s former-number-one Diva soars 10-6 (10,000 sold – on par) and Kate Bush’s The Whole Story steps up 8-7 (10,000 sold – down 9 percent).
Finally, Alanis Morrissette’s The Collection makes a return to the Top Ten, rising from No.13 to No.10 selling 9,000 copies this week (even with the previous week). The best-of set – which has sold 2.09 million to date – has now spent a total of forty weeks inside the Top Ten.
Onto Next Week: Joni Mitchell’s Blue should sell upwards of 60,000 units in the coming week, and will be clear for a ninth consecutive frame at the top spot!
Notable Moves on Top Catalogue!
No.19 – Rock a Little / Stevie Nicks’s third solo album – originally released in 1985 – sinks 18-19 this week, following its No.9 re-entry last month, selling 6,000 copies this week. Rock notches its eighty-sixth charting week, becoming the second longest-charting album from Nicks. It passes her 1983 record The Wild Heart which has spent a total of eighty-four weeks on the list: both Rock and Wild reached No.2 in 2017. Nicks’s longest-charting albums are as follows: Bella Donna (a record 136 weeks); Rock a Little (eighty-six); The Wild Heart (eighty-four); Timespace: the Best of Stevie Nicks (sixty-one); and Crystal Visions – the Very Best of Stevie Nicks (fifty-six).
Top Catalogue Albums
Industry Sales
Contemporary Albums generated sales of 504,000 units this week (up 4.7%) while Catalogue Albums recorded sales of 360,000 units (up 1.1%). Contemporary accounted for 58.3% of all consumption this week; versus 41.7% for Catalogue.
Total industry sales stand at 864,000 units this week, marking a gain of 3.2% from the previous week. Compared to the same week last year (when 1,001,000 albums were sold), consumption is down by 14.8%.
L.dK Music 