Adele Won’t Stream ’25’
UPDATE: A Spotify spokesperson tells Rolling Stone, “We love and respect Adele, as do her 24 million fans on Spotify. We hope that she will give those fans the opportunity to enjoy 25 on Spotify alongside 19 and 21 very soon.”
Adele‘s new record 25 will come out Friday, but don’t expect to find it on music-streaming services. Three anonymous sources with knowledge of the album rollout told The New York Times that reps from the singer’s label have notified the major services of the decision. The paper suggests that the singer was personally involved in the move.
Regardless, Billboard is speculating that the LP stands to set a record for first-week sales with sources claiming that they will ship 3.6 million physical copies. The last album to ship more than that was ‘NSync’s 2000 record No Strings Attached with 4.2 million copies. The trade magazine reports that Sony expects to sell 1.5 million CDs with downloaded versions of the album topping off at about a million in the first week. This means that, ostensibly, 25 could sell more copies than No Strings Attached, which holds the record for first-week sales in the SoundScan era.
In anticipation of tomorrow’s release, Adele is in full promotion mode. She’s performed her 25 hit “Hello” live in a BBC special, clarified that the record is more “make-up record” than breakup album in an interview with Zane Lowe, debuted the new ballad “When We Were Young” and performed a special concert at New York City’s Radio City Music Hall earlier this week. The singer recorded the Radio City show for an NBC special that will be broadcast on December 14th.
Adele will appear as musical guest on the November 21st episode of Saturday Night Live and will sing on Today on the 25th.