Last week's Top 5 new entries fared thus:

 

1-OUT Lottery Winners

2-2 Nines

3-48 Jessie Ware

4-38 The National

 

This sort of thing is normal, not many people care about week 2 and beyond anymore.

 

Nines is doing very well , let's see if he holds on to number 2

 

I don't think it's been mentioned yet that The Lottery Winners aren't Top 100 in the midweeks. I wonder if they could achieve the biggest fall from #1 (for an album that debuted at #1). It would need to do worse than 1-126.

 

Cases like this make me think charts should be more biased towards streams. What does number 1 mean when there's hardly any interest in it in the 2nd week after release

I find the album charts almost completely pointless now. Albums have gone from mainstream products to fanbase souvenir purchases, and we’re supposed to care when the weekly chart is a mix of ‘who has the biggest fanbase or best promo campaign this week’ combined rather haphazardly with ‘which artists’ hits playlists are streaming best this week’.

 

I mean 7-91 for Freya is crazy. She’s no longer a singles artist, clearly not an albums artist if she’s diving over 80 places on her second week, so what is she now by the traditional definition of one or the other?

 

Ed’s sales are higher than I expected though personally, which is good, I thought he’d get about 50k for the week.

 

I think the albums chart is pretty solid when looking at streams. Most people consume music through streaming now and the album chart can't be manipulated through playlists.

 

And even for singles I think the impact of playlists can be overstated. It definitely makes the song more discoverable but I've seen many playlisted songs that don't do much in the charts

I think the albums chart is pretty solid when looking at streams. Most people consume music through streaming now and the album chart can't be manipulated through playlists.

 

The Weeknd - The Highlights says hi.

 

Also all those extra weeks Mabel's first album got when songs not even from the same era kept being added to it.

I think Ed is perfectly comfortable if his 'undeniable flop' album that by his own words was not meant to be chasing mainstream success in the way all his previous albums were is still easily the biggest first week sale of the year so far, and most likely will be higher than all but 3 albums that came out the whole of last year as well ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I predicted 46-60k for its opening sales in the prediction poll so it's doing slightly better than I was expecting, based on the dropoff in the success of the lead single + promo single compared to his last era.

 

Hope 'Boat' can cling onto the top 20, it's his best song in quite a while for me.

 

Also relieved to see Guetta dropping from the First Look chart, keeping the dream alive that it'll never go top 10. (I know it probably still will, but we can delay the inevitable). 'Green Green Grass' being absent from First Look surely must have been a mistake though if it's showing up at #13 again now? I'm sure it normally falls from its First Look position! Maybe they accidentally put it on ACR and then realised it wasn't meant to be lol ~ (happened to 'See You Again' last week so wouldn't put it past them, even though there's no reasonable explanation for making such a basic error).

 

And Nines' album possibly coming to join the list of albums spending multiple weeks peaking at #2. Poor hen being denied by sus multibuying. (Of course failing that the #2 will most likely just be a different album adding to its already multiple weeks at a #2 peak x).

 

Yay at 'Satellite' looking set to make a top 100 debut as well *.* my comfortable 2nd favourite song from Harry's album so great to see it getting the single treatment and continuing Harry's ability to get at least moderately successful post-album hits (hope this one can go top 40 again like 'Falling' and 'Golden' managed). A few of those other top 100 debuts are looking not so great though - already know that Toosii song is garbage in particular oop. Nice at 'Dog Days Are Over' already being back even before a reset, think there's a good chance it will get one by the end of the week.

Just because people predicted it to do poorly, and it's doing better than your (bad) prediction, it doesn't mean it's not a flop lol

Ed is one of the biggest superstar in the world, you have to compare to how people like Taylor or Harry do

The Weeknd - The Highlights says hi.

 

Also all those extra weeks Mabel's first album got when songs not even from the same era kept being added to it.

 

Oh yh defo agree that compilations and 'Best of shouldn't be in the chart and shouldn't be able to add more than 1 song from a previous album.

 

Why doesn't the OCC add these rules as they seem like common sense to me? Is there something I'm missing out on

I'm just saying you can enjoy whatever pleasure you're deriving from calling it a flop, I can't see that it'll be bothering him x

I'm still not sure what the point is of calling something a "flop" whether it be Ed's album or anything else. What does it matter? It's going to reach #1 regardless and it's not as though his livelihood depends on whether it sells 50k or 200k. He might have sold less than you expected, but it seems an odd take to keep pursuing the argument.

The even more odd thing is that 75% of our posters were expecting Ed to sell somewhere between 45K and 100K this week according to the prediction thread so this debate is happening despite the fact he's basically performing almost exactly as Buzzjack expected him to :lol:

 

Ah well, each to their own I guess!

Just because people predicted it to do poorly, and it's doing better than your (bad) prediction, it doesn't mean it's not a flop lol

Ed is one of the biggest superstar in the world, you have to compare to how people like Taylor or Harry do

 

And it turned out Taylor did way more than people expected :lol:

Ed is certainly not flopping, he seems to be performing exactly to the tune that he wanted to. He set up with comments when he announced the album that it wasn’t commercial and that he didn’t want to be a huge star anymore. If anything, he’s probably performing better than he planned to.

Just because people predicted it to do poorly, and it's doing better than your (bad) prediction, it doesn't mean it's not a flop lol

Ed is one of the biggest superstar in the world, you have to compare to how people like Taylor or Harry do

 

Flop

 

(of a performer or show) be completely unsuccessful; fail totally.

 

a total failure.

 

informal. a failure: The play was a complete/total flop. Thesaurus: synonyms, antonyms, and examples. someone or something that is not successful. (English meaning - Cambridge Dictionary)

It's not like he's released some avante garde style album or jazz album, it's still pop music that's at the top of every mainstream radio and streaming playlist possible. At this rate it will be lucky to beat the first week sales of his "side project"

It's not like he's released some avante garde style album or jazz album, it's still pop music that's at the top of every mainstream radio and streaming playlist possible. At this rate it will be lucky to beat the first week sales of his "side project"

I mean, the side project was more streaming friendly in sound. You can't tell me stuff like I Don't Care and South of the Border isn't more commercial than Boat or even Eyes Closed (which isn't uncommercial as such but it's certainly less tailored to typical streaming success).

That "not commercial" is a bit weird when he is on a STADIUM tour as we speak. Of course his music IS commercial, it's not taking any risks, and even artists who do stadium tours can take risks. He probably thinks he is on his "Nebraska" or "Folklore" era, but those albums were very successful both commercially and especially critically.

Edited May 9, 20232 yr by Sour Candy

He is going for the folklore (and +) sound, which is very commercial and streaming-friendly.

 

Moreover, let's not forget that he and his label spent a fortune producing a music video for every song on the (main) album. :coffee:

Edited May 9, 20232 yr by Voodoo

That "not commercial" is a bit weird when he is on a STADIUM tour as we speak. Of course his music IS commercial, it's not taking any risks, and even artists who do stadium tours can take risks. He probably thinks he is on his "Nebraska" or "Folklore" era, but those albums were very successful.

It's more "less commercial" than "not commercial". There's certainly no Bad Habits, Shivers or Shape of You type song on this album to really pull in the streams. I don't think him being on a stadium tour negates that, especially when the tour (by its name +–=÷×) covers all eras, not just this one (and was actually announced way back).

 

There's nothing to say this era can't be successful (and it's Ed Sheeran, he'd have to go REALLY left-field to be unsuccessful with how popular he is), and the sales are solid so far, it's just not chasing chart success so much this time by Ed's own admission.

 

Moreover, let's not forget that he and his label spent a fortune producing a music video for every song on the (main) album. :coffee:

Don't really see how this contradicts anything?

Yeah god forbid we acknowledge the massive drop in sales :rolleyes:

 

While totally ignoring the massive drop in sales across the whole market!?

 

Also a drop in sales doesn’t make it a flop, an album going at least silver and possibly gold in one week is hardly a flop by any standards even back when sales were much much healthier.

He is going for the folklore (and +) sound, which is very commercial and streaming-friendly.

 

'folklore' still charts lower every week than the much older '1989' and the much derided 'Lover' (edit: or at least it's charting lower than them at the moment, 'every week' may not be exactly true). And '+' is always Ed's lowest charting album (when it's charting at all). That's not to say it's some wild avant garde experimental sound but it's definitely fair to say it's not chasing success in the same way as his last few albums.

 

(I say having not heard the album yet, but 'Boat' definitely fits the bill of what I expected from the way he marketed the album, and I've seen plenty of people saying that's fairly representative of the rest of the album, minus 'Eyes Closed' of course which again by his own admission was a leftover from '=' and presumably designed to make sure there was at least one hit single from the album. Which does slightly devalue what he was going for imo but whatever, one song can't save its streaming numbers and even then it wasn't that huge of a hit anyway).

Just because people predicted it to do poorly, and it's doing better than your (bad) prediction, it doesn't mean it's not a flop lol

Ed is one of the biggest superstar in the world, you have to compare to how people like Taylor or Harry do

 

I don’t think you understand what the word flop means. Underperformance perhaps but the biggest first week sales of the year with just half a week is no flop by any stretch of the imagination.