Saturday, December 14, 2024

Frank Ocean’s “Blonde” Makes a Ripple Not Waves at Number 1 with Good But Not Great Numbers

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“Blond(e),” the new album by Frank Ocean, didn’t hit last week until late Saturday– meaning, it missed a whole day– Friday– and most of Saturday for sales.

Also, there’s no actual CD, it’s all digital, either for download or for streaming only on Apple Music.

The result: “Blonde” came in at number 1, with so so numbers. The album had 232,140 downloads and the equivalent of 50,000 streams on Apple Music. If it had been available on other streaming services, the number might have been higher. If there had been a physical CD, people might have bought it. ALso, a radio friendly single wouldn’t have hurt.

As it is, without “Blonde,” this would have been another classic low sales week in the depressed record business. The number 2 album, by Lindsey Stirling, sold 42,690 copies. The number 50 album sold around four thousand copies.

The big news of the week is that Emeli Sande, our favorite new singer of 2012, is releasing a new album in September. It’s about freakin’ time.

Roger Friedman
Roger Friedmanhttps://www.showbiz411.com
Roger Friedman began his Showbiz411 column in April 2009 after 10 years with Fox News, where he created the Fox411 column. His movie reviews are carried by Rotten Tomatoes, and he is a member of both the movie and TV branches of the Critics Choice Awards. His articles have appeared in dozens of publications over the years including New York Magazine, where he wrote the Intelligencer column in the mid 90s and covered the OJ Simpson trial, and Fox News (when it wasn't so crazy) where he covered Michael Jackson. He is also the writer and co-producer of "Only the Strong Survive," a selection of the Cannes, Sundance, and Telluride Film festivals, directed by DA Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus.

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