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News November 15, 2017

Taylor Swift’s ‘Reputation’ is putting up huge numbers on both sides of the Atlantic

Lars Brandle
Taylor Swift’s ‘Reputation’ is putting up huge numbers on both sides of the Atlantic

It’s early days, but Taylor Swift and her team at Big Machine Records can safely declare Reputation a hit. In just four days since its release, the album has surged past the million sales milestone in the U.S., where it’s now the biggest-selling album of the year, according to data published overnight by Nielsen Music.

Reputation, Swift’s sixth studio set, is at 1.05 million sales and is just the first LP to hit seven figures since Adele’s blockbuster ’25’ shifted 1.16 million units in the frame ending on Christmas Day 2015, the record’s fifth week on sale, Billboard reports (Adele’s third album opened its account with a mind-boggling 3.38 million sales).

So, TayTay keeps her reputation as a chart queen firmly intact. Her latest album, which arrived last Friday (Nov.10) after months of hype and four pre-release tracks, becomes the pop star’s fourth effort to bag a million-selling week after ‘1989’ (1.29 million in 2014), ‘Red’ (1.21 million, 2012) and ‘Speak Now’ (1.05 million, 2010).

‘Reputation’ should eclipse the first-week start of each of her previous albums, industry sources say, and it torpedoes the year’s previous best seller, ‘Divide’, by Ed Sheeran, who performs on the Reputation track ‘End Game’.

Taylor Swift is also well-ahead of the game in the U.K., where Reputation cruised to No. 1 on the midweek charts by outselling its closest rival, Sam Smith’s ‘The Thrill Of It All’, by a ratio of 2:1. Reputation could blast past 100,000 first-week sales in the U.K., good enough for gold certification (platinum is recognised at 300,000 units).

Taylor Swift, like Adele in 2015, managed these lava-hot numbers with old-fashioned CD sales and digital downloads. Reputation has been held back from streaming services, at least for the time being. While it appears Swifties aren’t struggling to buy their copies, the streaming services aren’t happy to be cut out of the action. Troy Carter, former manager of Lady Gaga who now works for Spotify in the role of global head of creator services, warned the decision to hold ‘Reputation’ off streaming platforms would facilitate piracy.

“A lot of it is going to be pirated,” he told the Internet Association’s Virtuous Circle Summit on Monday, Variety reports. “It kind of sets the industry back a little bit.” Carter admitted he was cool with her stance: “Taylor is super smart,” he said. “We are not mad at her for the decision she made.”

This article originally appeared on The Industry Observer, which is now part of The Music Network.

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