Adele album on track for record sales
The long-awaited new album by Adele, “25,”
looks set to break the modern record for first
week sales, the makers of the benchmark US chart
said Saturday.
Billboard, the music industry journal
that publishes weekly charts, said that
“25,” released on Friday, appeared likely
to sell at least 2.5 million copies in the
United States.
“No Strings Attached” by NSYNC, the boy
band starring Justin Timberlake, is the
only other album that opened with sales
above two million since systematic
weekly tracking began in 1991.
“No Strings Attached” sold 2.4 million
copies in its first week in 2000 — a year
before the launch of Apple’s iTunes,
which drastically changed buying habits.
In a rare move that surely boosted sales,
Adele’s label chose not to make “25”
available through streaming, the vast-
growing platforms that offer unlimited,
on-demand music online.
“25” is still available for purchase
digitally and sold 900,000 copies on
iTunes in the United States on the first
day, according to Billboard.
“25” also looked to be one of the biggest
debuts ever in Adele’s native Britain,
where the Official Charts Company said
it sold 300,000 copies on its first day.
The only album with a bigger first-day
debut was “Be Here Now” by Oasis,
which sold 424,000 copies in 1997 —
again, an era in which overall music
sales were much higher.
“Adele truly is a once-in-a-generation
artist. Her appeal spans age groups and
genres, from children to teenagers, right
through to mums and dads, uncles and
aunties,” Official Charts Company chief
executive Martin Talbot said in a
statement.
The music industry has placed enormous
hopes in Adele with “25.”
Her last album, “21” from 2011, was the
top-seller in the United States for two
straight years and is the biggest release
in Britain so far this century.
“25” — led by the giant hit “Hello” —
consists largely of songs of heartache
and nostalgia, following the pattern of
“21” which featured the tear-jerking
ballad “Someone Like You.”
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