"Beyoncé" is the biggest-selling Album of 2014 with sales of over 2.3 million and 933.000 of those in 2014. No other Act has managed to stay on top of the World's Best-selling Album charts for as long since Adele's "21". One Direction's "Midnight Memories" is the second best-selling Album of 2014 with sales of 583.000 and Eminem's "The Marshall Mathers LP 2" is third with sales of 496.000.
“Beyoncé", Queen Bey’s Dec. 13 midnight surprise arrived through a one-week exclusive, album-only release on iTunes. Like Jay Z’s everything-at-once-release with Samsung, it shut out streaming, retail and individual track sales, forcing listeners to focus on the album as a cohesive work. The result seemed to transform everyone—industry executives, journalists, Twitter cynics, casual listeners—back into a fan.
“She took a high risk and was highly rewarded for it,” says Guy Oseary (No. 38 on Billboards Power list), who manages Madonna and U2 at his Untitled Entertainment. “I love what she did. Thank you, Beyoncé—it brings much-needed excitement and buzz to our industry.”
Though there was great discussion of the game-changing implications of both releases—and whether they can ever be re-created—perhaps what’s most important is that Jay Z and Beyoncé found ways to focus attention on music itself. For years label bosses have said that audiences will pay for music if they’re excited, and that turns out to be true: Magna Carta . . . Holy Grail sold 528,000 in its first week, which beat Jay’s previous recent releases, according to Nielsen SoundScan. In total, the album sold 1.1 million copies in 2013, one of only three rap releases to go platinum last year. Beyoncé moved even quicker with the singer’s surprise blitz—in the first three hours of release the album sold 80,000 copies through iTunes and, sources say, 850,000 in the first week. In its four weeks of release it sold 1.3 million. That total was enough to make it the eighth-biggest-selling album in America of 2013 in less than a month.”
“The release of Beyoncé’s album was a great way to finish the year, and a chief reminder for me that artists, songwriters and producers have really good ideas,” says Warner/Chappell Music president of creative for North America Jon Platt (No. 51), who brought both Beyoncé and Jay Z to the powerful publisher. “We’re supposed to help them nurture and realize those dreams, not kill them. At times, experienced company executives can be so smart at outlining every reason why an idea can’t work instead of focusing on how it can work. In the case of Beyoncé’s album, her team focused on how it could work.”
Island Def Jam and Columbia, Jay Z and Beyoncé’s respective labels, worked closely with the artists and their management teams to execute these disruptive deals, but other label heads remain most impressed by the artists’ take-charge approach. “Just watching [the Beyoncé] phenomenon happen was really exciting—and admittedly more enjoyable watching it from the sideline than being in the midst of it,” says Republic Records president/COO Avery Lipman (No. 17). “It said, ‘Look what a certain type of artist can do with the press of a button.’”
And RCA Music Group president/COO Tom Corson and CEO Peter Edge (No. 21) see the moves as part of a shift toward social media and partners outside the traditional label system. “The dynamic of social media moving the needle is now at the center of any smart campaign,” Corson says. But more than ever, Edge argues, “finding new opportunities has become more significant—Jay Z with Samsung, Justin [Timberlake] with Target and Budweiser. It’s not terribly new, but it seems like this is the new dynamic of the business—to find partners. We see ourselves as partners not only with the artists and their camps but with other companies and aligned businesses.”
Jay Z and Beyoncé were announced the most Powerful in the Music Industry by Billboard Magazine. Billboard based their top 100 most Powerful People in the Music Industry on their ability to reshape the world according to their vision. And who in the music industry did so better in the last year than this power couple?
Leveraging their star power to release new albums in unprecedented ways, Jay Z through Samsung and Beyoncé through iTunes, they instantly changed how the industry and fans thought about interacting with music. He gave his album away; she charged a premium price for hers. But they both used the element of surprise to restore the excitement that used to accompany a new release proving content is truly king.
For years, Jay Z has been building the most powerful artist-driven empire in music, ever since he founded Roc-a-Fella Records in 1996 to bypass a music industry uninterested in his debut album, "Reasonable Doubt". By 2004, he'd become president/CEO of Roc-a-Fella distributor Def Jam. A major investor in Steve Stoute's Translation Advertising, he left Def Jam and founded the multifaceted entertainment group Roc Nation in 2008, in partnership with Live Nation. The company oversees a varied roster including Rihanna, Shakira, Stargate, Calvin Harris, Timbaland and Deadmau5, and, in partnership with Creative Artists Agency, has added sports to its oversight. And though he's cashed out his stake in NBA team the Brooklyn Nets, Jay Z remains an influential presence at Brooklyn's Barclays Center, which he helped open in 2012 with a series of concerts.
Since parting ways with father Mathew Knowles as her longtime manager in 2011, Beyoncé has proved through her Parkwood Entertainment just how powerful and productive a self-managed artist can be with Beyoncé. When the album arrived just before year-end 2013, it silenced months of whispers about delays, scrapped songs and missed deadlines, and it did so with 14 critically acclaimed songs accompanied by 17 jaw-dropping videos, all meticulously curated and co-edited by Beyoncé herself.
"Artists have always had the power but courage is in short supply. It's just that the hip-hop generation believes in the possibilities," says Lyor Cohen (No. 74), a longtime associate of Jay Z's from his days running Def Jam in the mid-'90s, and founder of new music venture 300. "Jay and Beyoncé don't listen to the noise, they make the noise."
The decision to release Jay Z's Magna Carta . . . Holy Grail for free exclusively for five days to 1 million Samsung customers was hailed as a major coup for Samsung to build buzz against rival Apple as it launched its Galaxy S4 smartphone. But the deal wouldn't have happened had Jay and a Roc Nation team led by business managers John Meneilly and Desiree Perez not been actively seeking a partner to help them forge "#newrules," as the rapper famously tweeted from his rarely used Twitter account on June 17.
"We've got to continue to find ways to put music in the hands of the fans, and I think this is a great way to do it," Big Machine Label Group CEO Scott Borchetta (No. 41) told Billboard at the time of the Jay Z announcement. "You've got to have cutting-edge ideas with cutting-edge companies who are ready, willing and able to reach a mass audience. It's great Jay Z is forcing all of us to think this way.
Very few country Artists manage to breakthrough, but when Scott Borchetta signed Taylor Swift at just 15, he knew she had serious potential to explode on the international scene. “I was always fascinated by artists that could appeal globally,” he says. “So my goal with Taylor from the beginning was that she was going to be a global superstar.”
Almost ten years later, Scott, who is President and CEO of Big Machine Label Group, has fulfilled his ambition. Taylor at just 24, is now Nashville's biggest selling Act and one of the World's best-selling Recording Acts, having sold almost 30million albums, more than 6.5million of these internationally.
Her latest world tour to nearly 70 Cities in North America has made her one of the top selling box office successes of 2013. She will be in London for five arena shows next month, and one concert in Berlin. She is also nominated in four categories at next Sunday’s Grammy Awards and is a multi nominee at this year's World Music Awards which honor the best-selling most popular artists from the major record-buying countries..
Taylor’s last studio album "Red" was released in the autumn of 2012, and sold 1.21m copies in its first week in America alone, the biggest opening tally there for more than a decade. Red became Taylor's first chart-topper in the UK, and also topped the album charts in Australia, Canada, Ireland and New Zealand. As of January 2014, the album has sold over 3.969 million copies in the United States and over 6 million copies worldwide.
When asked about Taylor's next Album which she is presently working on, Borchetta says “While her music has definitely become more worldly, she lives in Nashville and there’s always going to be a sense of that running through her music. I encourage her to make what she wants to make, so the next record could be anything from pure pop to bluegrass, who knows.”
Beyoncé's self-titled Album is top of the World's best-selling Albums chart for the fifth consecutive week after selling 163.000 copies. "Beyoncé" is the biggest-selling Album of 2014 with sales of 2,29 million in total and 933.000 of those in 2014. No other Act has managed to stay on top of the Album charts for as long since Adele's "21". One Direction's "Midnight Memories" is the second best-selling Album of 2014 with sales of 583.000 and Eminem's "The Marshall Mathers LP 2" is third with sales of 496.000.
The Soundtrack to "Frozen"' stays at N°2 in the top-selling Albums chart after selling 110.000 copies. New Entry for K-Pop Duo Tohoshinki at N°3 with their new Album "Dong Bang Shin Ki" which is N°1 in Korea after shiftng 89.000 copies this week!
Eminem's "The Marshall Mathers LP2" slips from N°3 to 4 with sales of 86.000. After 7 weeks on the chart and 82.000 copies sold this week, One Direction's "Midnight Memories" slips from 3rd position to 5th.
Rapper Kid Ink enters the top 40 at N°6 with his Album "My Own Lane" and sales of 72.000.
New Zealand Phenomenon Lorde slips one place from 6 to 7 after selling 70.000 copies of "Pure heroin" worldwide.
Katy Perry's smash Album "Prism" slips from 5 to 8 with sales of 58.000 this week. The Album has been in the Top 10 for 15 weeks.
European Superstar Stromae enters the Top 10 world's best-selling albums chart at N°9 with his smash Album "Racine Carrée" selling another 52.000 Albums this week.
Robbie Williams closes the top 10 with "Swings Both Ways" and sales of 49.000.
Only One more New Entry this week apart from Kid Ink and Tohoshinki, and its J-Pop Act RIB's with "Riboot" and sales of 19.000.
Eminem's "The Monster" stays in 2nd position for the 2nd consecutive week.
Pharell's new single "Happy" soars up the charts from N°6 to 3. OneRepublic's "Counting Starts" drops one position from last week's peak to N°4.
Avicii's "Hey Brother" moves up from 8 to 5 after 13 weeks on the chart. Lorde's Breakthrough hit "Royals" drops from 4 to 6 and Avicii's "Wake Me Up" also slips from 5 to 7 after an incredible 29 weeks in the top 10.
One Direction's "Story Of My Life" moves from 9 to 8 and Katy Perry's "Roar" slips from 7 to 9 after 22 weeks on the chart. Katy also closes the top 10 with her third single "Dark Horse."
New entries this week include Aloe Blacc's "The Man" which makes a smash debut at N°28 this week. Beyoncé's second single "XO" debuts at N°34 and "Drunk In Love" moves up 3 to N°26.
K-Popstar Ailee enters this week's charts at N°37 with her new Single "Singing Got Better" and Rapper Kid Ink enters the ToP 40 with his first hit Single "Show Me," a collaboration with Chris Brown. Another K-Pop Act Girls's Day closes this week's Top 40 with "Something"
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