Taylor Swift’s 1989, the strongest pop turn for the longtime country singer, roared to the top of the Billboard 200 album chart with the biggest opening week in a dozen years for the declining album sales industry.
Backed by number one hit Shake It Off and weeks of TV appearances, 1989 sold 1.3 million copies, according to figures compiled by Nielsen SoundScan. 1989 not only goes platinum by selling over a million units but also becomes the top-selling album released this year. But the best opening week may not mean much to a recording industry grappling with consumers shifting from physical albums to streaming. “It means less for the music industry than it does for Taylor Swift,” said analyst Bill Werde, a former editor of Billboard. “What we’ve seen over the last few years is that Taylor seems to be the last human standing that can move these kinds of albums,” he said.
Swift has also thumbed her nose at the fast-growing and popular online music streaming service Spotify, pulling her entire catalogue from the platform this week without comment. “Streaming is the one meaningful area in the recorded music business that is showing growth still,” he added. “There are a lot a people who think this is the future.” “What matters more and more these days is meaningful exposure of your music to fans that are going to buy your concert tickets and buy your merchandise and support you in all these other ways in whatever form that happens,” Werde said.
Swift is set to head off on another world tour in May 2015.
Published in The Express Tribune, November 8th, 2014.
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