It’s Official: Taylor Swift Sells a Million
As expected, Taylor Swift had the biggest sales week in more than five years, selling 1,047,000 copies of her new LP, Speak Now, according to Nielsen Soundscan. It was the biggest sales week for an album since 50 Cent’s The Massacre moved 1,141,000 units in March 2005.
Photos: Taylor Swift’s Family Album: Shots of Our Cover Girl’s Picture-Perfect Life
Speak Now becomes the 16th album to move a million copies in a week since SoundScan began tracking sales in 1991. The last album to do so was Lil Wayne’s Tha Carter III, with 1,006,000 in June 2008.
The all-time record-holder is ‘NSYNC’s 2000 album No Strings Attached, which sold a whopping 2,416,000 units in its first week.
Check out Austin Scaggs’ hilarious interview with Taylor early this year.
Other Speak Now factoids, according to Billboard: It had the second-largest sales week of any country album since 1991 (Garth Brooks’ Double Live debuted with 1,085,000 in 1998), bringing Swift the biggest sales week of any female country act since 1991. And she had the biggest sales week for a female artist since Britney Spears’ Oops! I Did It Again took the top spot in 2000 with 1,319,000.
Billboard: Taylor Swift Sells Over 1 Million in Record Billboard 200 Debut