BIRDY FLIES TO NO.1 WITH YOUNG HEART!
Young Heart earns Birdy her first No.1 hit; meanwhile, Taylor Swift’s folklore & evermore make history!
This week on Top Contemporary Albums, British singer-songwriter Birdy nabs her first chart-topper with her fourth studio album Young Heart. It follows a pair of Top Five hits for the singer: 2011’s self-titled hit No.4, and 2016’s Beautiful Lies reached No.2. She also scored a Top Fifteen hit this year with the four-track EP Piano Sketches (which this week regresses 14-16 although with a gain in units).
Young Heart debuts with first week sales of 93,000 units, comprised of 89,000 in pure sales and a further 4,000 units derived from pre-sales due to singles.
The impressive start means that Young has already been certified Silver for selling at least 60,000 copies, becoming Birdy’s fourth release to earn the distinction. Her other certifications are as follows:
- Beautiful Lies – Platinum
- Birdy – Gold
- Piano Sketches – Gold
- Young Heart – Silver
Her two earlier studio albums mentioned make gains over on Top Catalogue Albums…
Young Heart unseats Lana Del Rey as Chemtrails Over the Country Club slips to No.2 after logging a fifth non-consecutive week at the top spot. The LP moved 68,000 copies this week (down 8 percent).
Taylor Swift’s Fearless (Taylor’s Version) steps down 2-3 a month after debuting atop the list, shifting 41,000 copies (down 18 percent).
Swift celebrates multiple achievements this week thanks to her pair of juggernaut records folklore and evermore. The albums swap places this week, with the former rebounding to No.4 (with 35,000 sold – up 9 percent) and the latter falling back down to No.5 (with 34,000 sold – even with last week).
To date, folklore has sold a staggering 3,322,000 units since its release in July 2020. That makes it both the third bestselling album since records began, and just the third record in history to be certified 11 x Platinum (note: it is also the third to achieve Diamond status for selling 3,000,000 units). folklore has spent a total of sixteen weeks at No.1 (the second longest reign ever) and this week it clocks a forty-first showing inside the Top Five and Top Ten.
Follow-up evermore (released last December) has now inched over the 2,000,000 sales mark, having moved 2,028,000 in its twenty-one week shelf-life. The album – which peaked at No.1 for thirteen weeks – is just the eighth album to sell over 2,000,000 units, and stands in prestigious company.
With both folklore and evermore having brought in individual sales of over 2,000,000 each, Taylor Swift achieves something that only Lana Del Rey had previously managed (with Norman Fucking Rockwell! and Lust for Life).
Currently, the artist who looks most likely to join the two women in this elite club is Annie Lennox. Her 1992 debut Diva has sold 2,179,000 to date, and her 1995 sophomore set Medusa has shifted 1,844,000 so far.
Outside the Top Five: London Grammar’s Californian Soil keeps at No.3 after debuting and peaking at No.3 (20,000 copies – down 26 percent); Miley Cyrus’s two-week-leader Plastic Hearts shoots 10-7 (17,000 units – even with last week); Arlo Parks slides 3-8 with her debut album Collapsed in Sunbeams (16,000 units – down Celeste’s No.3-peaking Not Your Muse drops 7-9 (16,000 units – down 20 percent); The Weeknd’s The Highlights slips 9-10 (16,000 units – down 11 percent).
Onto Next Week: Both Birdy’s Young Heart and Lana Del Rey’s Chemtrails Over the Country Club are currently in the running for the No.1 spot next week; both LPs look likely to end the week with over 60,000 copies sold.
Notable Moves in Top Contemporary
No.11 – Cry Forever / Australian singer Amy Shark pays her visit to L.dK Weekly as her new album Cry Forever debuts at No.11 with sales of 14,000 units in its first week.
No.12 – Petals for Armor / Hayley Williams’s debut solo album proved her potential upon its release last year. Initially debuting at No.8, it climbed into the Top Five the following week, and would eventually peak at No.3, spending a total of thirty weeks inside the Top Ten. Already having sold in excess of 1.16 million copies, Petals celebrates a whole year on L.dK Weekly as it rebounds 13-12 in its fifty-second charting week. The album sold 13,000 this week, and ranks above her sophomore set FLOWERS for VASES / descansos for the first time, as the latter dives 8-14 shifting 12,000 copies.
No.16 – Piano Sketches / As Birdy claims her first No.1 hit on Top Contemporary Albums, her preceding four-track EP Piano Sketches sports a gain to 10,000 sold, although it backtracks 14-16 on the weekly ranking. Piano reached a peak of No.12 over two months ago, and has now become Birdy’s first album to spend exactly half a year (twenty-six weeks) on L.dK Weekly. Notably, the EP is the bestselling project ever to not reach the Top Ten, having sold just under 200,000 copies to date.
TOP CONTEMPORARY ALBUMS
Certifications: Silver (60,000); Gold (100,000); Platinum (300,000); Multi-Platinum (600,000 etc.); Diamond (3,000,000).
JONI MITCHELL TALLIES RARE TENTH WEEK AT NO.1 WITH BLUE!
As Blue stays at No.1; Lana Del Rey reaches a new milestone with Norman Fucking Rockwell!; Birdy’s Beautiful Lies re-enters at No.6!
Joni Mitchell’s 1971 album Blue marks a tenth successive week atop the Top Catalogue Albums Chart, selling 50,000 copies this time around (down 14 percent). This historic album is only the sixth to achieve a double-digit reign, and only the fourth to manage the feat in consecutive weeks.
Longest Runs at No.1:
- Seventeen weeks – Norman Fucking Rockwell , Lana Del Rey (2019 – 2020)
- Sixteen weeks – folklore , Taylor Swift (2020 – 2021)
- Thirteen weeks – evermore , Taylor Swift (2020 – 2021)
- Twelve weeks – A Star is Born – OST , Lady Gaga & Bradley Cooper (2018 – 2019)
- Eleven weeks – Lust for Life , Lana Del Rey (2017 – 2018)
- Ten weeks – Blue , Joni Mitchell (2021)
Longest Consecutive Runs at No.1:
- Fourteen weeks – Norman Fucking Rockwell! (09 September 2019 – 09 December 2019) & folklore (03 August 2020 – 02 November 2020)
- Thirteen weeks – evermore (21 December 2020 – 15 March 2021)
- Ten weeks – Blue , Joni Mitchell (08 Mar 2021 – 10 May 2021)
- Eight weeks – Future Nostalgia (06 April 2020 – 25 May 2020)
- Seven weeks – LOVE + FEAR , MARINA (08 April 2019 – 20 May 2019)
Four Million: This week, Lana Del Rey’s Norman Fucking Rockwell! becomes the first album since records began to exceed sales of four million units! With 20,000 sold in the past seven days, the record-breaking set has sold 4.008 million since it was released in August 2019.
Historically, Del Rey now holds the record for the first albums to sell one million copies (Lust for Life – tied with Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours); two million copies (Lust for Life) and four million copies with NFR! Lady Gaga & Bradley Cooper’s A Star is Born was the first record to be certified Diamond and sell three million units.
NFR! remains steady at No.2 on Top Catalogue Albums, logging its fifty-first week in the Top Five, and eighty-first week in the Top Ten. Both figures are all-time bests.
Elsewhere in the Top Ten, Del Rey leaps 9-5 with her No.4-peaking Honeymoon selling 14,000 copies (up 55 percent); and keeps at No.7 with the No.2-hit Born to Die: the Paradise Edition on sales of 13,000 copies (up 30 percent).
Florence + the Machine’s former-number-one High as Hope holds at No.3 with 17,000 units sold (down 11 percent); Stevie Nicks’s Crystal Visions – the Very Best of Stevie Nicks is also unmoved at No.4 moving 15,000 units (down 20 percent).
Outside the Top Five: Birdy re-enters at No.6 with her 2016 album Beautiful Lies (13,000 units – 550 percent). The album originally peaked at No.2 on the discontinued Weekly Top 50 in 2017, and has been certified Platinum.
Annie Lennox’s chart-topping Diva slides 6-8 (11,000 units – up 10 percent); Kate Bush’s No.3-peaking The Whole Story tumbles 5-9 (11,000 sold – on par with last week); and capping the Top Ten, Alanis Morissette’s The Collection retreats 8-10 (9,000 sold – even with last week).
Onto Next Week: Joni Mitchell’s Blue should easily clear a further 40,000 units, which would nab the album its eleventh consecutive week at the top spot.
Notable Moves on Top Catalogue
No.14 – Dog & Butterfly / HEART’s 1978 release Dog & Butterfly enters Top Catalogue Albums at No.14 with sales of 8,000 units. It marks the third Top Twenty hit in a row for the sister-led group, but also becomes their lowest-peaking album yet: their two other charting hits were their self-titled set (No.1) and Bad Animals (No.6).
Top Catalogue Albums
Industry Sales
Contemporary Albums generated sales of 490,000 units this week (up 8.1%) while Catalogue Albums recorded sales of 341,000 units (up 5.2%). Contemporary accounted for 59% of all consumption this week; versus 41% for Catalogue.
Total industry sales stand at 831,000 units this week, climbing by 6.9% from the previous week. Compared to the same week last year (when 779,000 albums were sold), consumption is up by 6.6%.
L.dK Music 