I'd say pretty impressive sales for Gaga so far anything over 50k overall isn't that common anymore and she is looking to pass that with ease

What was the previous international album to do 50k. Sabrina?

International yes sabrina

You have to compare to her previous opening and how vinyl has exploded since & the reception of the album, then its like the opposite of impressive imho

Gaga’s sales are good and many artists don’t cross the 50k mark anymore - however she’s falling into the territory of not particularly gaining new fans just fans who purchase every format and keep sales stable, which is why the boom in vinyl sales and streaming are not reflecting a huge increase on this album versus Chromatica - like we’ve seen with the consistent sales for Kylie’s albums (Golden, Disco, Tension).

6 minutes ago, Bjork said:

You have to compare to her previous opening and how vinyl has exploded since & the reception of the album, then its like the opposite of impressive imho

Vinyl sales completely depend on who the artist is and who their main audience are- just look at Taylor/Coldplay last year and their spreads between formats. Gaga fans are more likely to buy CDs I'd imagine.

Here's an interesting video on the subject, this guy is the physical formats guru

For a standard album it’s decent figures but due to Gaga not releasing a proper one in awhile I thought it’d be bigger for sure. This time last year Beyonce and Ariana were just about hitting 40k(or not even in one case) for the week so in that context it’s good.

12 minutes ago, Liam S said:

For a standard album it’s decent figures but due to Gaga not releasing a proper one in awhile I thought it’d be bigger for sure. This time last year Beyonce and Ariana were just about hitting 40k(or not even in one case) for the week so in that context it’s good.

Not that female artists need to be compared all the time but actually both cases. COWBOY CARTER and eternal sunshine both fell a bit short of 40k in their first week, the former was annoyingly about 10 sales away.

I hope Chappell can knock herself off #1 next week

32 minutes ago, Bjork said:

You have to compare to her previous opening and how vinyl has exploded since & the reception of the album, then its like the opposite of impressive imho

Just because Taylor sells ridiculous amounts of vinyls doesn't mean everyone will 😂😂

Look at the bigger picture there has only been 6 or 7 weeks the number 1 managed to break the 50k barrier , 2 of those wernt even by much

Just shows the overall album market is smaller than when she last released , even Beyonce didn't do 50k

So really these are fantastic sales for Gaga

30 minutes ago, gasman449 said:

Vinyl sales completely depend on who the artist is and who their main audience are- just look at Taylor/Coldplay last year and their spreads between formats. Gaga fans are more likely to buy CDs I'd imagine.

Here's an interesting video on the subject, this guy is the physical formats guru

I think collectors still very much go for vinyl and would expect Gaga’s to be strong based on some that have sold out, plus the amount of variants.

The CD never totally died off and I think some of its resilience is partly due to artist tour pre-sales - people are opting for the cheapest format to get a tour pre-sale code hence why eBay is littered with CDs and cassettes selling below cost price the week an artist released an album whereas vinyl holds its value or increases.

I’m in two minds about Gaga’s variants having a huge impact on sales. Chromatica had way more bundled items with cheaper items and signed art cards. This time around it’s mostly expensive double vinyl’s starting from £35.99/40.99 in HMV I wouldn’t say at that price point you’ll get loads of fans buying every variant (Although I’m sure a few have bought additional copies)

Sure we had bundled signed art cards but the only bundle was the double CD bundle and Vinyl/CD option. Chromatica had cassette bundles (3x) bundled with the CD and bundled items early on. I know they did release some UK cassettes but they sold out so quickly I don’t think it was many at all.

Let’s not forget a lot of artists are doing the ‘Pre-Sale codes with pre-orders/orders of album’ which Gaga hasn’t done…..

Personally I don’t think she’s doing anything different to any other artist. Tate / Taylor / Sam Fender all did the presale codes for the tours with album orders which clearly impacts sales.

I’m not shading Sam Fender either but just look at the number of variants he had including picture discs, mini disc, 3 cassettes, numerous vinyl editions, signed art card bundles and on release week signed lyric sheet bundles bundling 4 items together.

We should just stop the whole ‘they had tonnes of variants’ to try and invalidate sales because at the end of the day not many artists have strong enough fanbases to buy multi formats.

Edited March 11, 20251 yr by Mr. C. Joel

I'm amazed anyone can paint Gaga's sales as underwhelming, they're fantastic for any artist, especially one who's over 15 years deep into their chart career!

2 hours ago, Bjork said:

You have to compare to her previous opening and how vinyl has exploded since & the reception of the album, then its like the opposite of impressive imho

Her previous two album openings were 27,000 for Joanne and 53,000 for Chromatica. This is looking higher than both them, most likely? So what is your point?

You are also forgetting 'Chromatica' also had the big number 1 smash of 'Rain On Me', and was also very well received by fans and critics at the time, who were looking for fun Gaga back to get through lockdown blues. You can maybe argue that 'Mayhem' is a better album, but is there much a difference in hype between the last two eras? I would argue it's stayed around the same/steady.

I can only talk about from my point of view but I am a well-known Gaga stan and bought ONE cd variant on Monday by walking into a record store. So not all stans are buying different variants and pre-ordered stuff.

My copy doesn't count for UK charts anyway, but just an example.

I’m a Gaga stan and I’ve bought more editions of

MAYHEM than I have any other Gaga album to date! I’m possibly getting more too although not this week.

The sales show that she’s maintained healthy interest though. I think Gaga has shown she can appeal to new audiences and also keep stans happy. Plus when you think back to 2016 and what Joanne debuted with who’d have thought over 8 years later she’d on course for #1 with a midweek figure like this. I’m pretty pleased although it’s more in the chart run / longevity where we’ll see the true appeal.

Incredible opening sales for MAYHEM! To invalidate them is pretty meaningless and random because on any other week for pretty much any other artist the numbers would be hailed as very healthy and impressive.

I'm so proud of her smashing it once again and potentially with even more sales than her past 2 solo studio albums, showing great growth!

Mayhem will most likely have better chart run than Chromatica did. Hope she announces the tour properly soon.

Amazing sales for my girl! Hoping for 60k on Friday and silver on week 1!

Gaga's done tricks in the past to get more sales/#1's - didn't she sell the BTW album digitally for $1.99 in the US during it's first week at one point?