Taylor Swift‘s new album, The Life of a Showgirl, debuts at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart after selling a record-breaking 4.002 million equivalent album units – including 3.48 million pure album sales – in its first week, marking the largest single-week sales and album consumption figures since Luminate first began tracking data in 1991. Opening week sales of The Life of a Showgirl breaks the record previously set by the opening frame of Adele’s 25, which recorded 3.482 million units (3.378 million pure album sales) in November 2015. This achievement gives Swift her record-setting 15th No. 1 album, the most ever for a solo artist – surpassing Drake and JAY-Z – while making her second only to The Beatles all-time record of 19 No. 1 albums. Notably, all 15 of Swift’s full-length studio and rerecorded albums, from 2008’s Fearless onward, have debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart, with The Life of a Showgirl also making Swift the only artist in history to have eight different albums sell at least 1 million copies in a single week.
The rest of the Billboard 200 Top 10 features seven former No. 1 albums, including last week’s leader, the KPop Demon Hunters soundtrack, which drops one spot to No. 2, while Morgan Wallen’s I’m the Problem falls one slot to No. 3, Cardi B’s AM I THE DRAMA? slides down one place to No. 4, Sabrina Carpenter’s Man’s Best Friend holds at No. 5, Bad Bunny’s DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS vaults up four spots to No. 6 (after he hosted the season premiere of NBC’s Saturday Night Live on Oct. 4), SZA’s SOS jumps up three slots to No. 9, and Wallen’s former chart-topper, One Thing at a Time, ascends three places to No. 10. The Top 10 is rounded out by Olivia Dean’s The Art of Loving, which rises one spot to No. 7 in its second week on the chart, while Alex Warren’s You’ll Be Alright, Kid jumps up three slots to No. 8. (Billboard)
