There was by no means any doubt that Taylor Swift’s newest launch, “The Tortured Poets Division,” was going to be massive. The query was simply how massive.
And the reply is, gigantic.
“The Tortured Poets Division,” Swift’s eleventh studio album, opens at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 album chart with historic numbers, together with enormous leads to streaming and vinyl gross sales. It’s Swift’s 14th chart-topping title, tying her with Jay-Z for the second-most No. 1 albums by any act within the 68-year historical past of Billboard’s flagship album chart; solely the Beatles, with 19, have extra.
In its first week out, “Tortured Poets” had the equal of two.6 million album gross sales in the USA, based on Luminate, which tracks the info behind Billboard’s charts. That’s the largest general first-week take for any album since Adele’s “25” in 2015, which opened with almost 3.5 million, pushed by in-store CD gross sales.
The “equal” determine is a composite, primarily based on a method utilized by Luminate and Billboard to reconcile the assorted methods listeners now purchase and devour music. And in every means, “Tortured Poets” was a smash.
It offered 1.9 million copies in conventional album gross sales, together with 859,000 for vinyl alone, which blew away Swift’s personal earlier file of 693,000 LPs, set simply six months in the past. Advance gross sales by means of Swift’s web site — begun the day Swift introduced the album, on the Grammy Awards — have been key. She supplied an array of tinted vinyl variants and CDs, some in “deluxe” variations marketed with autographs or on-brand trinkets like engraved bookmarks that went for as a lot as $50 apiece. In accordance with Billboard, 1.4 million copies of the album have been offered on its first day, many preordered over the past two months.
The opening adopted a promotional blitz that included a blanketing of social media and radio, tie-ins with streaming platforms and IRL happenings like an Easter-egg-filled library set up at a Los Angeles purchasing heart. “Tortured Poets” additionally arrived following a number of years of Swift’s growing saturation of popular culture, together with her Eras Tour producing an estimated $1 billion in ticket gross sales final yr, with months left to go.
In conventional album gross sales, “Tortured Poets” had the third-biggest end result since SoundScan, the predecessor of Luminate, started protecting dependable gross sales knowledge in 1991. Forward of it are solely ’N Sync’s “No Strings Hooked up” (2.4 million in 2000) and “25,” which offered slightly below 3.4 million copies when it got here out. (Adele didn’t initially launch her full album on streaming companies, however the streams for its first single, “Whats up,” added a bit to her general quantity.)
Swift’s vinyl take alone is an eye-popping high-water mark within the format’s long-bubbling revival. As not too long ago as 2006, solely about 900,000 LPs have been offered in the USA in a whole yr. By embracing the format and releasing collectible editions, Swift almost equaled that sum herself in a single week. In 2023, based on Billboard, she moved 3.5 million vinyl information, about one out of each 15 LPs offered in the USA.
Two hours after Swift launched the 16-track “Tortured Poets,” she revealed an “Anthology” version of it — digital solely, a minimum of for now — that expanded the unique LP right into a double album with 15 further songs. The total 31-track digital doorstopper garnered 891 million streams in the USA in its first week, one other excessive; the earlier file, 746 million for Drake’s 25-track “Scorpion,” had stood since 2018.
In accordance with Swift’s label, Republic Data, “Tortured Poets” had the equal of 4 million gross sales all over the world final week, and it begins at No. 1 on charts in Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Australia and numerous different nations.
Critiques of “Tortured Poets” have been blended to optimistic; along with outright raves (Rolling Stone labeled it an “prompt traditional”), some criticized the size of the complete double album and the standard of Swift’s newest songs. In The New York Instances, Lindsay Zoladz referred to as the discharge “sprawling and infrequently self-indulgent,” and deemed the 15 added tracks “largely superfluous.” The review-aggregation web site Metacritic credited the preliminary “Tortured Poets” LP with an general rating of 76 out of 100, and gave “The Anthology” a 69. These could also be passing grades, however for Swift — whose final new studio LP, “Midnights,” acquired an 85 — they’re notably low, and recommend a break up in vital versus in style opinion in regards to the celebrity’s music.
Any naysaying opinions, nonetheless, did nothing to gradual the consumption of “Tortured Poets.” Swiftie consideration has now shifted to the European leg of her tour, which begins close to Paris on Might 9, and whether or not any of her newest batch of songs will make the set checklist.
Additionally on this week’s chart, Future and Metro Boomin’s “We Don’t Belief You,” the primary of the Atlanta hip-hop stars’ two current collaborative releases, is No. 2. (Their second, “We Nonetheless Don’t Belief You,” was No. 1 final week however falls to No. 6.) Beyoncé’s “Cowboy Carter” is No. 3 and Morgan Wallen’s “One Factor at a Time” is No. 4. Pearl Jam’s “Darkish Matter” opens at No. 5, the veteran rock band’s thirteenth LP to achieve the Prime 10.
