This week, both R. Kelly and August Alsina hit the headlines when they took aim at their respective teams for the handling of their current albums.
The veteran and the newcomer released their projects – ‘The Buffet’ and ‘This Thing Called Life’ – yesterday. And following their very public comments, all eyes are on how said LP’s are set to perform in the marketplace.
Wonder no more though, because the first sales projections are in. Without further ado…
Per Hits Daily Double, Alsina is set to bow with 30,000-35,000 – a figure insiders say may rise to 40,000 when factoring in streaming. [Remember 1000 plays via on-demand services now equates to one unit “sold” and impacts chart positions.]
As for Kelly, ‘The Buffet’ is on-course to debut with physical sales of 28,000-33,000 and between 32k-37k when factoring in streaming.
[For what it’s worth, Kelly’s latest album – 2013’s ‘Black Panties’ premiered to first week US sales of 113,000. While Alsina’s 2014 debut ‘Testimony’ launched with 67,000]
The figures make for a riveting read and are quite literally open to a number of interpretations.
Because, one could level the argument that they aren’t “bad” per se given that they are quite consistent with the sales of most acts in the R&B arena. Hence, any perceived notion of “poor performance” is more reflective of the genre at large (which directly plugs into what Kelly vented about earlier this week).
Still, with the likes of Tyrese and Jill Scott launching LP’s this year with numbers more than double these, it begs the question of whether Kelly and Alsina’s “problem” lies within the product itself or the industry climate they’ve released in.
Food for thought.
Both terrible albums.
I hate queens like u. U dont even have the cds
You Stupid b****. its on spotify! f*** all the way off. why would I pay for trash?
I wanna be Augusts thot!!
A drug dealer and a hobo are more your league sis. stay in your lane
What does your father have to do with this?
Lol
Well you got the thot part right….
B**** you Stan for an R&B diva. When was Chante Moore’s last hit?
Chante Moore has more talent in her right eyelash than Ciara has in her entire testosterone filled body.
The albums just aren’t good enough, simple as. Also, their promo game was poor.
‘
When Trey Songz was releasing the album that came before Trigga, he went on an expensive radio tour, visiting all Urban and RnB radio all over the country, he launched with decent numbers of over 100K rivaling Chris Brown and Usher who did the most, and I like Usher.
‘
So if you want to sell your music, make sure your product is good and make sure you know your audience.
Yeah Trey’s album was pretty solid. I still listen to ‘Smartphones’ from time to time
I agree. I think R. Kelly has lost touch with his audience. He is strying to cater to a younger audience instead of producing and selling that music to other artists to market. No one wants to hear club songs from a 50 year old man. He should be making music towards an older audience like Babyface is and selling the hip-hop influenced tracks to other artists.
August Alsina has been sleeping. Just because it is near Christmas does not mean people are automatically put your cd in their shopping carts unless you are Adele.
A lot of people didn’t even know they were releasing albums, I’d say it’s promo. August went on to The Breakfast club and the only thing I got out of that was he has suicidal thoughts and family problems. I saw a few R Kelly interviews again I didn’t know he was promoting an album.
That’s the problem. They keep talking too much about their personal life instead of new music and meanings behind lyrics. Where are the live performances like they used to do? Nobody seems to promote abroad in europe or elsewhere
Ain’t nobody care about these two FLOPS!!!
Aside from the albums being utter crap…
One is a PEADOPHILE and the other only seems to gain any firm of relevance when he’s showing his DĪCK on Instagram.
BYE.
Augusts music is too depressing and his vocals are nasally struggle. Don’t nobody wanna hear 15 tracks of whining. As for R.Kelly, his glory days been up.
Nobody wants to hear Chante Moore at all f**.
Great Hera! At these predictions….this is awful….
Still more than Wackie and that BM been everywhere promoting. lol
Shut up, Mark.
Tell MooMoo to do the same, my hears hurt from all those scratched up, flat note, cracking vocals. Static has more range.
STFU, cause she sounds great on her new sold out shows
Where’s Anti?
It’s coming. 4 of the 8 rooms has been unlocked.
Shelved indefinitely.
LOL
Hopefully Chris Brown and Monica have better sales next week. Seem to be solid albums. #Royalty #CodeRed
Monica will sell 40K. Chris, maybe 50k, 60k if lucky.
Karma for the pervert.
Man, and we thought 80 to 100K were flops. Remember when you guys dogged Ashanti’s Brave Heart and she did 24K indie. Janet did 120K and she is indie. Indie is winning.
But how much have they sold to date?
How much has “Me. I Am BLOCKriah: The Elusive LINEBACKER” sold to date, sis?
Well over 100k, and Rebel Fart?
Unbreakable sold around 300K WW, Me. I Am A Flop sold a 120K in the US, And I can’t find anything update on Brave Heart, but it opened with 28K. Not bad at all being indie.
Yikes!….Those are Indie rock bands numbers, isn’t Urban more popular?
At least the indie rock bands get all their money. I don’t understand why R&B artist are on labels. But on the real, most pop artist do these numbers as well.
Still wondering when your KKK ugly ass is going to follow in the footsteps of your fav.
Is anyone surprised? No ones checking for either of them tbh
If this were MC this article would look different! Hating A** SAM!
These r&b artists need to go independent. These major labels are doing nothing for them! They can’t perform at award shows, they can’t get played on pop radio and they can’t go platinum. At this point, R. Kelly, Usher, Monica, Brandy and even Chris Brown can release their own albums and still tour successfully while keeping their profits.
this thing called life is a great album yall m************ just sleeping on him and buying s*** instead
I got my copy off itunes and im loving it Song Cry so emotional
I’m just waiting for Monica’s Code Red.
Artists need to quit whining and produce music their labels believe will become hits. When you’re onto a hit, you just know and feel it. If that feeling isn’t in the air, the label is going to put an artist’s product out there and let it flop.