Madonna‘s 14th studio album – ‘Madame X’ – may have been greeted with great anticipation upon its initial announcement in April, but that excitement only waned as material from the project was unveiled.
Despite all five of the singles lifted from the set failing to impact the Hot 100 ahead of its June 14 arrival (her first studio album to lay claim to such), Madge pressed forward with its release and promotion. Visiting major television and radio outlets around the world to build awareness, ‘X’ jumped to #1 on iTunes in over 60 countries (including the U.S.) just hours after its release.
Now, with its inaugural tracking week of streams and sales behind it, the ‘Medellin’-led LP’s final numbers are in and have given the Queen of Pop her 9th reign atop the Billboard 200. Details inside:
Madonna’s ‘Madame X’
First Week Sales (SPS): 95,000
First Week Sales (Pure): 90,000
Chart Position: #1
Madame X’s debut sum of 95,000 equivalent album units is comprised of 90,000 in album sales, 1,000 in TEA units and 4,000 in SEA units.
Madame X grants Madonna her ninth leader on the Billboard 200. Madonna continues to have the second-most No. 1 albums among female artists, trailing only Barbra Streisand, who has 11.
The album’s sales were bolstered by a concert ticket/album sale redemption offer with the Queen of Pop’s upcoming theater tour (starting on Sept. 12 in New York at Brooklyn’s Howard Gilman Opera House), as well as an array of merchandise/album bundles sold via her official website.
I was about to congratulate her until I read the tour bundle bit ??♂️??♂️
Y’all so late. Y’all really should go get a 9-5 but then you’ll probably be late for that too
Queen. ? Like Jasmine said, she’s outsold ALL the others and she’s STILL selling….they’ll never catch up! ??
Janet sold more
Unbreakable — which was released on Oct. 2 — arrives atop the chart with 116,000 equivalent album units earned in the week ending Oct. 8, according to Nielsen Music. Of that sum, the set sold 109,000 in pure album sales.
Lol. That was 4 years ago ? That album should be compared with Rebel Heart which was released just months before Unbreakable.
Exactly!
Rebel Heart sold 116k pure sales/121k total in March 2015.
Grandonna had 20x promo than Janet had with Unbreakable and still sold only half of Janet’s album???? Kiiiiiiii
Unbreakable did slightly less than Rebel Heart which was released a few months earlier. Why are you comparing an album released in 2015 with one released in 2019? That’s silly.
@BeyBest: while I always want JANET to win, we really should celebrate both ladies continued success because that will make it easier for Beyonce, Alicia, GaGa, Rhianna, and so on to continue to do what they are doing presently. Plus never forget that white gays go to the mat for their divas – ESPECIALLY when they appear in the underdog position in their careers.
What is the merchandise bundle? Does merchandise come with the album?
First off, the 5 songs released before the album dropped were NOT all singles…only Medellin and Crave were. The album as a whole is brilliant! Like many other albums, not just Madonna’s, the choice of singles is mindboggling to me. Here Madonna made this great experimental, different than anything else out there album and the lead single is one of the weakest songs on the album. The second single, Crave is probably the most radio friendly single, but why? The singles should have been the more experimental songs like Faz Gostoso or Batuka or the very catchy multiple language Crazy. Atleast then she might have (and may still) caught people off guard and peaked their interest in this sound. She could have started something new on radio and gotten some big hits. But no, for whatever reason she made this wonderful different sounding album and the singles are trying to be pigeon holed into what might sound like current radio songs. Watch a few Madame X reaction videos and you will see every single person go crazy for Faz Gostoso. I know God Control is the next single, and I like it for the most part, but it is not going to be a radio hit. As I said earlier I sometimes buy a new album, listen to the whole thing several times and I wonder who on earth picked the singles because they are often the weakest songs. I just don’t get it? Especially on an album like Madame X.
@Gary: this was my sentiment exactly after listening to the album. WHY were the weakest/most non-interesting tracks served/leaked/what have you as a prelude to the album. I bought the interesting tracks and paid the others dust…
Lol, the album is not “brilliant”, it’s her weakest effort since American Life. Nothing stands out from this album.
I’m in a minority (highly aware) but I really LOVED American Life. #AndImnotsorry lol
I agree on 100% of what you said.
Don’t pick on Madonna…supposed current younger big artists are struggling to sell albums as well and they don’t have 350 million records sold under their belt like Madonna. Justin Timberlake’s latest was a bomb. Katy Perry went from hot to totally not when her last album totally tanked. Mariah Carey doesn’t sell anymore. Miley Cyrus Younger now did not sell well. Even Taylor Swifts Reputation album sold nowhere near what her last couple did, even though I believe it was the top selling album of its release year. Right now the only person selling albums is Billie Eilish and good for her because her album is totally different than anything else on radio. I personally thought Reputation was great btw. ?
I don’t get the shade regarding tour bundles. If you have fill out additional fields if you want a copy of the album and are already paying hundreds for a concert ticket. To me that is a far more authentic mode of sales that streaming. Regardless 36 years into her legendary career Madge is still Queen.
Her NINTH No.1 album 30 plus years into a historically successful career! Congrats Madonna! ???
I’m not surprised. This is why her antics at this point is unnecessary.
This is not unusual. Albums don’t sell like they used to anymore. People tend to buy M** downloads as individual songs. It’s a different market now. The top 100 best selling albums of all time are all from the 70’s, 80’s, and 90’s. That’s it. Once we moved into the internet digital age in the 2000’s, no artist has been able to break the record by selling the amount they used to in decades before. And Madonna’s at the top of the best selling albums of all time several times. Someone commented about Janet Jackson, but she’s nowhere in that top selling album list. And I love Janet.
Unmitigated rubbish…but then again, it’s not as if Madonna has any actual talent.
She sucks! Arrogant, rude and talentless. How anyone can be a fan of this obnoxious cow is beyond me.