Taylor Swift’s new album, “The Tortured Poets Department,” has soared to the top of the UK charts, achieving the highest first-week sales in seven years.
Taylor Swift’s 31-track double album, “The Tortured Poets Department,” has set a new record by moving 270,000 UK chart units in its first week, surpassing her previous record of 204,000 units with her 2022 album, “Midnights.”
The last album to surpass these first-week sales figures was Ed Sheeran’s “Divide” in 2017, which sold 670,000 copies.
With this achievement, Swift has tied with Madonna for the most UK number one albums by a female artist, each having secured 12 chart-topping albums. Only four acts boast more number ones: The Beatles (16), The Rolling Stones (14), Robbie Williams (14), and Elvis Presley (13).
Swift’s achievement also brings her level with Bruce Springsteen, who also has 12 number one albums.
Last Friday, “The Tortured Poets Department” debuted as a standalone 16-track album. Swift surprised her fans two hours later with a second volume titled “The Anthology,” comprising 15 additional tracks.
Collectively, the project delves into Swift’s personal journey over two tumultuous years, encompassing heartache, criticism, and the complexities of fame.
Reviews of the album were varied. Olivia Horn of Pitchfork suggested that Swift was “largely revisiting familiar ground,” a sentiment echoed by Larisha Paul of Rolling Stone, who remarked that Swift seemed to be “going through the motions without making progress.”
The same publication’s Rob Sheffield disagreed, calling the album a “wildly ambitious… cathartic confession” that could be the star’s “most personal album yet“. Helen Brown in the Independent agreed: “The whole album is a terrific reminder of the intense, personal connection Swift can conjure in song.”
Fans either didn’t mind about any lukewarm reviews or didn’t care. The album has broken dozens of records in its first week of release. Here is a round-up of them:
First album to reach one billion Spotify plays in a week
By the close of Friday, “The Tortured Poets Department” had set a record on Spotify as the most streamed album in a single day.
Just five days later, it reached its billionth stream, marking the first time any album has ever achieved this milestone.