UPDATE: The final numbers for Everything Is Love are in. With all factors (listed below) considered, Hov and B managed to sell 124,470 copies of the album with 69,996 of those coming for pure sales. This puts them at #2 this week behind 5 Seconds Of Summer who outsold them by around 15k copies.
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Jay-Z and Beyoncé dropped their surprise album Everything is Love this past weekend and the reaction from fans says they have scored a successful one.
But how much will they be able to move in the first week? HDD reports that The Carters’ set is currently on pace to sell 115-125k copies out of which 72-77k are expected to come from pure sales. At the outset, this certainly feels like a low number, considering one of the biggest artists in the world and one of Rap’s greatest joined forces on the long rumored album. But there are a couple of things which are a factor here.
One, the album was a TIDAL exclusive for a approximately a day before it went live on other platforms. Two, the Spotify release is restricted at this point as Everything is Love is only available for paid subscribers which leaves out a major chunk of audience. As it stands tight now, this number is only slightly more that what 5 Seconds of Summer’s new album Youngblood is expected to move (113-118k) so a number 1 spot on the Billboard 200 this week isn’t guaranteed just yet. Stay tuned for updates until we have the final number on Sunday.
Jay-Z’s now friend and old rival Nas’ new album NASIR is projected to move 80k in the first week (details here).