Prince beats Beyonce to no. 1 and sells 4.4 million albus in a week. This is unprecedented. Some experts expect Prince to remain on the charts for some time. It's like 1984 all over again and Prince is not here to see it. At least, he legacy is secure. And a new generation will know what good music actually sounds like.

http://www.startribune.co...378182491/

Prince rules Billboard chart with half of top 10 titles, 4.4 million albums sold

By Chris Riemenschneider Star Tribune

Even by the high standards of posthumous career boosts, Prince is breaking new ground when it comes to album sales in the wake of his death.

Minneapolis’ rock icon set a new record by landing five titles simultaneously in the top 10 of the Billboard 200 album chart. It’s the first time an artist has accomplished that since the chart was created in 1963 — a feat that can be partly attributed to his music not being available on most digital streaming sites.

Prince made the chart at the Nos. 2, 3, 4, 6 and 7 positions with “The Very Best of Prince,” “Purple Rain,” “The Hits/The B-Sides,” “Ultimate” and “1999,” respectively.

He likely would have made the No. 1 spot two weeks in a row if not for his 2004 Grammy Awards duet partner Beyoncé, who issued her much-ballyhooed new album, “Lemonade,” last week.

All told, Prince sold what Billboard itself called “a staggering” 4.41 million albums from the day after his April 21 death to the chart cutoff day last Thursday.

By comparison, David Bowie racked up 308,000 in U.S. album sales in the four days after his Jan. 10 passing. Michael Jackson sold 422,000 in the week after his death on June 25, 2009.

Prince’s “Very Best Of” alone sold 391,000 copies, according to Nielsen Music figures — and he had 18 more albums make the Billboard 200 chart. These figures include both physical and digital (download) sales.

“If people in Minneapolis had any doubt just how big Prince was to the rest of the world, this should settle it,” said David Bakula, a senior vice president at Nielsen Entertainment, which tracks album sales.

Those unprecedented sales numbers provide something of an I-told-you-so bragging right for Prince from beyond the grave. He undoubtedly sold more albums because over the past year he removed his music from sites such as Apple Music and Spotify, where songs are available on an unlimited basis with paid monthly subscriptions.

Only one streaming company, Jay Z’s Tidal, has rights to Prince’s music. Tidal has not commented on how Prince’s death boosted its numbers. Forbes magazine speculated it “could help Tidal pad its reported 3 million paid subscriber count and possibly lead to a sale to a larger company like Apple or Spotify.”

Said Bakula, “You would hear people saying, ‘I can’t find his songs online,’ and they had to resort to watching his Super Bowl performance instead. I’m sure he sold a lot more albums because of it.”

He’s selling a lot of song downloads, too. “Purple Rain” is the No. 1-selling single for the second week in a row. It sold 282,000 downloads, followed by “When Doves Cry” at No. 2 with 198,000. The last artist to hold the No. 1 and No. 2 slots on the Billboard singles chart was Taylor Swift in 2014.

Neill Olson, manager of Cheapo Records in south Minneapolis, believes Prince’s scarcity on streaming sites is “just a small reason” for the crush to own his albums, mostly on CD. And it truly has been a crush in stores all over the Twin Cities.

“We’re getting more stuff in, but we can’t keep it in stock very long,” said Olson, who noticed a lot more younger customers than normal clamoring for the records. “They’ve been telling us, ‘You can’t find his stuff online!’ It’s been a good introduction to brick-and-mortar record stores for a lot of them.”

As for the older customers who grew up buying CDs and vinyl LPs, Olson quipped, “We sort of say to ourselves, ‘Why don’t these people own these records already?’ ”

The numbers would have been even more impressive if Prince’s albums were more widely available on vinyl, a format that has rebounded in popularity in recent years. Only four of his most popular albums, including “Purple Rain” and “1999,” were reissued on vinyl in 2011.

Recognizing the demand this week, Warner Bros. Records pushed up the release dates for a series of nine classic albums to be reissued on vinyl in chronological order this year, starting with 1985’s “Around the World in a Day” on June 21 through 1992’s so-called “Love Symbol” album on Dec. 13.

Prince might be on the charts the rest of the year, in other words.

[Edited 5/5/16 15:02pm]

Actually, what's also interesting is how much more Prince is selling as opposed to MJ, Whitney, Bowie, etc...

jtfolden said:

Actually, what's also interesting is how much more Prince is selling as opposed to MJ, Whitney, Bowie, etc...

.

In fairness, there's a lot more material from Prince than MJ and Whitney combined. An album every year, opposed to every 4,5, or 6 years.

.

Once you're dead, there is no race or contest anymore.

I'm so happy all this great music is making its way to new fans. Like, somebody out there is gonna hear Something In The Water (Does Not Compute) for the first time today and have their mind completely blown, and then they're gonna compare it to all the auto-tuned crap that they've been listening to up 'til now. That makes me all kinds of happy.

eyewishuheaven said:

I'm so happy all this great music is making its way to new fans. Like, somebody out there is gonna hear Something In The Water (Does Not Compute) for the first time today and have their mind completely blown, and then they're gonna compare it to all the auto-tuned crap that they've been listening to up 'til now. That makes me all kinds of happy.

indeed

I can't get happy about this knowing the reason for the sales.

lrn36 said:

Prince beats Beyonce to no. 1 and sells 4.4 million albus in a week. This is unprecedented. Some experts expect Prince to remain on the charts for some time. It's like 1984 all over again and Prince is not here to see it. At least, he legacy is secure. And a new generation will know what good music actually sounds like.

http://www.startribune.co...378182491/

Prince rules Billboard chart with half of top 10 titles, 4.4 million albums sold

By Chris Riemenschneider Star Tribune

Even by the high standards of posthumous career boosts, Prince is breaking new ground when it comes to album sales in the wake of his death.

Minneapolis’ rock icon set a new record by landing five titles simultaneously in the top 10 of the Billboard 200 album chart. It’s the first time an artist has accomplished that since the chart was created in 1963 — a feat that can be partly attributed to his music not being available on most digital streaming sites.

Prince made the chart at the Nos. 2, 3, 4, 6 and 7 positions with “The Very Best of Prince,” “Purple Rain,” “The Hits/The B-Sides,” “Ultimate” and “1999,” respectively.

He likely would have made the No. 1 spot two weeks in a row if not for his 2004 Grammy Awards duet partner Beyoncé, who issued her much-ballyhooed new album, “Lemonade,” last week.

All told, Prince sold what Billboard itself called “a staggering” 4.41 million albums from the day after his April 21 death to the chart cutoff day last Thursday.

By comparison, David Bowie racked up 308,000 in U.S. album sales in the four days after his Jan. 10 passing. Michael Jackson sold 422,000 in the week after his death on June 25, 2009.

Prince’s “Very Best Of” alone sold 391,000 copies, according to Nielsen Music figures — and he had 18 more albums make the Billboard 200 chart. These figures include both physical and digital (download) sales.

“If people in Minneapolis had any doubt just how big Prince was to the rest of the world, this should settle it,” said David Bakula, a senior vice president at Nielsen Entertainment, which tracks album sales.

Those unprecedented sales numbers provide something of an I-told-you-so bragging right for Prince from beyond the grave. He undoubtedly sold more albums because over the past year he removed his music from sites such as Apple Music and Spotify, where songs are available on an unlimited basis with paid monthly subscriptions.

Only one streaming company, Jay Z’s Tidal, has rights to Prince’s music. Tidal has not commented on how Prince’s death boosted its numbers. Forbes magazine speculated it “could help Tidal pad its reported 3 million paid subscriber count and possibly lead to a sale to a larger company like Apple or Spotify.”

Said Bakula, “You would hear people saying, ‘I can’t find his songs online,’ and they had to resort to watching his Super Bowl performance instead. I’m sure he sold a lot more albums because of it.”

He’s selling a lot of song downloads, too. “Purple Rain” is the No. 1-selling single for the second week in a row. It sold 282,000 downloads, followed by “When Doves Cry” at No. 2 with 198,000. The last artist to hold the No. 1 and No. 2 slots on the Billboard singles chart was Taylor Swift in 2014.

Neill Olson, manager of Cheapo Records in south Minneapolis, believes Prince’s scarcity on streaming sites is “just a small reason” for the crush to own his albums, mostly on CD. And it truly has been a crush in stores all over the Twin Cities.

“We’re getting more stuff in, but we can’t keep it in stock very long,” said Olson, who noticed a lot more younger customers than normal clamoring for the records. “They’ve been telling us, ‘You can’t find his stuff online!’ It’s been a good introduction to brick-and-mortar record stores for a lot of them.”

As for the older customers who grew up buying CDs and vinyl LPs, Olson quipped, “We sort of say to ourselves, ‘Why don’t these people own these records already?’ ”

The numbers would have been even more impressive if Prince’s albums were more widely available on vinyl, a format that has rebounded in popularity in recent years. Only four of his most popular albums, including “Purple Rain” and “1999,” were reissued on vinyl in 2011.

Recognizing the demand this week, Warner Bros. Records pushed up the release dates for a series of nine classic albums to be reissued on vinyl in chronological order this year, starting with 1985’s “Around the World in a Day” on June 21 through 1992’s so-called “Love Symbol” album on Dec. 13.

Prince might be on the charts the rest of the year, in other words.

[Edited 5/5/16 15:02pm]

Good God Almighty - that's a lot of units!

I've read the article and although I felt glad about these sales and the many new people both young and old that are now discovering him, it still made me cry, just when I thought I had a good day today ...

jtfolden said:

1contessa said:

I can't get happy about this knowing the reason for the sales.

Whatever the details might eventually be revealed to be, it can be said with 100% certainty that Prince died for his art. The fact that that art is now making its way into the lives of millions of new people helps me feel better about all this.

TrivialPursuit said:

There's no way that figure is correct. Not a chance.

LittleBLUECorvette said:

jtfolden said:

Actually, what's also interesting is how much more Prince is selling as opposed to MJ, Whitney, Bowie, etc...

With Mike, I think more folks already owned a bunch of Mike material. When Mike passed a lot of folks I knew already had some of his stuff. With Prince, not so much. I lot of folks I know didnt have any Prince.

When Michael Jackson died, most people probably owned Thriller, Off The Wall, Bad, and Dangerous, and the streaming services weren't a huge thing back then, so it was easy for fans to collect all of his old albums and some Jackson 5 titles. And Whitney Houston only had six albums total (if you count The Bodyguard soundtrack), so her material was easy to collect. Prince, however, has put out more music than MJ, Whitney, and David Bowie combined, so while a lot of casual fans probably have 1999, Purple Rain, and Sign O' The Times in their music collections, and they mave have heard a few songs from Dirty Mind, Controversy, Parade, Musicology, and 3121, they probably arent aware of his stuff from For You, his self-titled album, or most of his work from Lovesexy forward, of which there was a lot of stuff. So many of these people aren't even aware of this other music and are discovering it for the first time.

right?! not surprising actually.

jtfolden said:

Actually, what's also interesting is how much more Prince is selling as opposed to MJ, Whitney, Bowie, etc...

I hear you

1contessa said:

I can't get happy about this knowing the reason for the sales.

homesquid said:

The actual Billboard headline says:

4 Million Prince Albums & Songs

"That sum combines his sales on April 21 (239,000 albums and 1.034 million song downloads), along with initial sales reports for the days of April 22-27 (496,000 albums and 2.24 million songs)."

http://www.billboard.com/...ales-death

So the Star Tribune is comparing 4 million copies (albums and songs) sold to just the albums sold by Bowie, MJ, etc. His album sales seem similar to MJs post-death, not sure what's the situation if you count any copy.

LittleBLUECorvette said:

jtfolden said:

Actually, what's also interesting is how much more Prince is selling as opposed to MJ, Whitney, Bowie, etc...

With Mike, I think more folks already owned a bunch of Mike material. When Mike passed a lot of folks I knew already had some of his stuff. With Prince, not so much. I lot of folks I know didnt have any Prince.

Yeah was going to say that also. BUT again I heard someone say PRINCE has a lot more stuff, true but a lot of the albums are not available. "For You" is impossible to find, so its really "Prince" "1999" "Purple Rain" "Around the World" and "Best of's" that are selling because they are all that is out there, plus the last 2 albums "HitNRun", but I haven't really seen a rise on the AOA album.

In France, nobody cares : the people, the medias, the record stores...

One week after his death he sold only 20.000 albums and 31.000 singles...

RODSERLING said:

TrivialPursuit said:

Ingela said:

NorthC said:

Ingela said:

I've read that folks went to Spotify and Appple streaming, and YouTube. Not finding him on those platforms, folks instead BOUGHT the albums. Both physical copies and digital. If Prince hadn't purged his music from the internet, it's very doubtful he would have sold anywhere near what he sold.

Maybe he was right after all?

No he wasn't.

The reason why nobody cares in France is because nobody had access to his catalog on youtube or streaming, so people forgot about him. Every release between 1994 and 2013 are out of print. That's a fucking commercial nonsense.

RODSERLING said:

jdcxc said:

RODSERLING said:

No he wasn't.

The reason why nobody cares in France is because nobody had access to his catalog on youtube or streaming, so people forgot about him. Every release between 1994 and 2013 are out of print. That's a fucking commercial nonsense.

With the massive interest and demand for his work, I guarantee his post Warners catalog will receive a repackaged release in the future. There is so much Prince to digest, they have not even scratched the surface...not even with the WB era.

No way...2 many contractual issues and you know it.

Moreover, the interest has already vanished.

RODSERLING said: