Super Yo
New Yorker
They only seem to care about the USA.
Songs of Experience - Let The Chart Speculation Begin
- Thread starter womanfish
- Start date
The friendliest place on the web for anyone that follows U2.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
prbiker15
Blue Crack Addict
It’s been like that forever.
kiwilad
Refugee
Speaking for NZ, unless you're plugged into the U2 online world you wouldn't know they even had a new album.
Nothing on the radio. No advertising. Nothing on the news/tv etc re promo/stories.
In store, I'm yet to find it. And I've been out Christmas shopping a fair bit. I'm sure it's there but I've gone out of my way to look and... nothing.
My friend, who is a casual U2 fan and owns several U2 albums, thought I was telling porkies when I started talking about a new U2 record.
It's true we're a tiny market. And U2 haven't toured here for 7 years. And there's no news of a coming tour. But even so, being that it's Christmas shopping season, just having the album announced and visible would have made a huge difference.
Put it this way - I can't believe they made it to 9! Only Interference's NZ brigade would know it exists
It does seem as though they aren’t doing that much promotion for this album — in general, not just in NZ. But isn’t it their management company, not U2 themselves, who make promotion decisions? Could it be their management doesn’t care that much about album sales because, in this market, there’s not that much money in it anyway? All the money is actually in touring? Could that be why they’ve done so much more promotion in the U.S. — because the first leg of the tour is here?
I’m just guessing — it’s not like I know much about this stuff, as witnessed by me misinterpreting the numbers earlier. I’d be interested in the opinions of posters who are more savvy about these things.
CosmoKramer
Rock n' Roll Doggie
- Joined
- Aug 19, 2004
- Messages
- 3,325
Australia and the U.K. used to be U2 strong holds when it came to album sales but now.....not so much.
Doesn't help that they haven't toured in almost a decade.
This should be the new Interference tag line.
doctorwho
Rock n' Roll Doggie VIP PASS
This is a good possibility. I think any album still needs a hit in today's world to get to high sales (or streaming and sales). I really like YTBT, and feel it is the strongest first single since Vertigo. But it has yet to cross over to being a big hit. If it does, that might be enough to propel SOE to bigger sales. Otherwise, this album may indeed struggle to sell 1M in the U.S., especially in today's soft sales world.
I'm sorry, Thunder is the most awful song of the year. I can't hardly believe it charts at all.
Y2K
Refugee
I'm with you. What an embarrassing piece of shit.
hasin73
Refugee
What a disaster of a song but this is a megahit !!! What a sorry state musical taste is in now-a-days.
patternshirt170
Acrobat
I guess releasing an album during the holiday season has another side to it and often sales bounces happen to existing popular albums and new ones, no matter whom, seem to get swept aside slightly. I wonder if any industry site, probably some subscription based one as usual, will break up the ticket bundles sale from the bonafide walk in/online purchases? It'd be interesting to see how many in the US/NA decided to go with the former option and how much that helped it's numbers over the #2 album.
Btw - slightly shocked at the OZ/NZ numbers, Bono clearly needs to start trapeze hanging upside down in a leotard like P!nk - voila instant down under love. That or a surfing cameo on Home & Away.
Btw - slightly shocked at the OZ/NZ numbers, Bono clearly needs to start trapeze hanging upside down in a leotard like P!nk - voila instant down under love. That or a surfing cameo on Home & Away.
They haven't played there in a decade, and they're old.
Why is any if this shocking to anyone?
Why is any if this shocking to anyone?
AndrewCowley
Refugee
Here in OZ they have pretty much fallen out of people's consciousness. They may as well not be producing new material at all. A nostalgia tour every so often will suit the average punter fine.
Unless they bundle tickets it wouldn't make any difference in the UK, outside the fan base there is little interest in new U2 music nowadays. They won't have much trouble selling concert tickets though
Must be the lack on uni graduates down under I suppose..
Super Yo
New Yorker
U2 Scores Eighth No. 1 Album on Billboard 200 Chart With 'Songs of Experience
The band is now the only group with No. 1s in the 1980s, 1990s, 2000s and 2010s.
U2 achieves its eighth No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 chart, as the rock band’s new Songs of Experience debuts atop the tally. The set bows with 186,000 equivalent album units earned in the week ending Dec. 7, according to Nielsen Music. Of that sum, 180,000 were in traditional album sales.
Songs of Experience nets the biggest week for a rock album in 2017, both in terms of overall units, as well as album sales. The last rock set to log a larger frame was Metallica’s Hardwired… To Self-Destruct, which launched at No. 1 on the Dec. 10, 2016-dated chart with 291,000 units, of which 282,000 were in album sales.
The Billboard 200 chart ranks the most popular albums of the week in the U.S. based on multi-metric consumption, which includes traditional album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA). The new Dec. 23-dated chart (where Songs of Experience debuts at No. 1) will be posted in full on Billboard's websites on Tuesday (Dec. 12).
Songs of Experience’s debut benefits from a concert ticket/album bundle sale redemption promotion in association with the act’s 2018 Experience + Innocence Tour, which begins in May.
Songs of Experience is a companion album to the band’s last studio effort, 2014’s Songs of Innocence. The latter title was initially released as a free download exclusively through Apple’s iTunes program on Sept. 9, 2014, but was not eligible to chart until it was commercially released on Oct. 14. In its first tracking week of sales, it sold 28,000 copies, and debuted and peaked at No. 9 on the Billboard 200.
U2 last topped the Billboard 200 with 2009’s No Line on the Horizon, which bowed with 484,000 copies sold in its first week, according to Nielsen Music. (The Billboard 200 transitioned to a consumption units-ranked tally in late 2014.)
In total, U2 has now led the Billboard 200 with Songs of Experience, No Line on the Horizon, How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb (2004), Pop (1997), Zooropa (1993), Achtung Baby (1991), the Rattle and Hum soundtrack (1988) and The Joshua Tree (1987).
Songs of Experience is also the seventh rock album to lead the Billboard 200 in 2017, following The Killers’ Wonderful Wonderful, Foo Fighters’ Concrete and Gold, LCD Soundsystem’s American Dream, Brand New’s Science Fiction, Arcade Fire’s Everything Now and Linkin Park’s One More Light. (In all of 2016, 10 rock sets led the list.)
https://www.billboard.com/articles/...50/u2-songs-of-experience-billboard-200-chart
The band is now the only group with No. 1s in the 1980s, 1990s, 2000s and 2010s.
U2 achieves its eighth No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 chart, as the rock band’s new Songs of Experience debuts atop the tally. The set bows with 186,000 equivalent album units earned in the week ending Dec. 7, according to Nielsen Music. Of that sum, 180,000 were in traditional album sales.
Songs of Experience nets the biggest week for a rock album in 2017, both in terms of overall units, as well as album sales. The last rock set to log a larger frame was Metallica’s Hardwired… To Self-Destruct, which launched at No. 1 on the Dec. 10, 2016-dated chart with 291,000 units, of which 282,000 were in album sales.
The Billboard 200 chart ranks the most popular albums of the week in the U.S. based on multi-metric consumption, which includes traditional album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA). The new Dec. 23-dated chart (where Songs of Experience debuts at No. 1) will be posted in full on Billboard's websites on Tuesday (Dec. 12).
Songs of Experience’s debut benefits from a concert ticket/album bundle sale redemption promotion in association with the act’s 2018 Experience + Innocence Tour, which begins in May.
Songs of Experience is a companion album to the band’s last studio effort, 2014’s Songs of Innocence. The latter title was initially released as a free download exclusively through Apple’s iTunes program on Sept. 9, 2014, but was not eligible to chart until it was commercially released on Oct. 14. In its first tracking week of sales, it sold 28,000 copies, and debuted and peaked at No. 9 on the Billboard 200.
U2 last topped the Billboard 200 with 2009’s No Line on the Horizon, which bowed with 484,000 copies sold in its first week, according to Nielsen Music. (The Billboard 200 transitioned to a consumption units-ranked tally in late 2014.)
In total, U2 has now led the Billboard 200 with Songs of Experience, No Line on the Horizon, How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb (2004), Pop (1997), Zooropa (1993), Achtung Baby (1991), the Rattle and Hum soundtrack (1988) and The Joshua Tree (1987).
Songs of Experience is also the seventh rock album to lead the Billboard 200 in 2017, following The Killers’ Wonderful Wonderful, Foo Fighters’ Concrete and Gold, LCD Soundsystem’s American Dream, Brand New’s Science Fiction, Arcade Fire’s Everything Now and Linkin Park’s One More Light. (In all of 2016, 10 rock sets led the list.)
https://www.billboard.com/articles/...50/u2-songs-of-experience-billboard-200-chart
mikal
Blue Crack Addict
That’s really impressive about having a #1 album in 4 decades. It also makes me feel really old.
superchuk5
Refugee
The numbers are solid, which is good. Surprised there's so much distance between them and Swift & Stapleton (TBH I was prepared for a #3 debut). I don't think this will go platinum because albums don't sell today unless you're Taylor Swift, Drake, Adele, or Beyonce, but having that eighth #1 is a great feather in their cap.
CosmoKramer
Rock n' Roll Doggie
- Joined
- Aug 19, 2004
- Messages
- 3,325
Odd how mid-week there was an article about how Swift and U2 would “battle it out” for the top spot. This was due to Taylor having 147k SPS last week and then this week she released her album to stream sites. Not only did she not go up in SPS but she dropped about 50%.
And you wonder why they keep coming back to the US
trainmaniac
War Child
At least in FNAC Portugal, is also nr 1... probably nr 1 here, then.
https://www.fnac.pt/cd-musica/h6#bl=MMmusica
https://www.fnac.pt/cd-musica/h6#bl=MMmusica
