Wednesday, May 18, 2011

'Checkmate!' Week 3 Sales



安室奈美恵 - "Checkmate!"

Position: #2

Week 3: 44,168
Total: 380,171

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16 comments:

Anonymous said...

only 380,171 in week three... its not that great :/ i thought her sales are higher, maybe better than past<future, cause checkmate is awesome. maybe its because of the earthquake... i dont know.

Cipy said...

First week sales were good, then it dropped a little too much, but it's still good overall.

Bigbang took the lead this week but with just about 65000 sold units. Not that great considering all the hype (which I don't really get) around this band.

Anonymous said...

Considering it's a compilation of new and (mostly) old songs that Namie has collaborated with other singers on, I think the sales have been really good. Albums like these don't sell much, to my knowledge.

If the album had been a brand new one, and not a "best collaborations", the sale would've been at least as high as Past<Future, I'm sure.

jt said...

These sales are great! You have to keep in mind that the number of sales is not on par with U.S. sales. Every country has their own Platinum, Gold, Diamond sale quota. So even tho these numbers appear low by U.S. standards, they're much stronger in Japan/East Asia.

Cipy said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Cipy said...

Even if it is a compilation album it could have made way more sales. Look at Best Fiction, just 2 new songs and it sold better than Play, Queen of Hip-Pop and Style put together. Yes, things were a little different then, but still compilation albums can make great sales. Maybe because it is a colaboration album, but there were known names, especially in the new songs.
Anyway, considering the situation, it sold good, but i'm still waiting for another big name to release something in order to compare.

Anonymous said...

For cipi. Her best fiction album is her best compilation and reason hy it sold 2 million copies is because 1st is all namie no songs have feat .. It's just her. And also it has 17 tracks and 17 videos no artist in the world has done that I am in USA and never seen an artist do that this compilation checkmate is not really all her is other artist that ain't as big as her in japan but the album is still good go namie ;)

Cipy said...

I didn't know about the 17 videos thing, this explains the sales. I had the three albums prior to Best Fiction and so I didn't buy it, but now I'm a little tempted by the 17 videos. If you have it, do you recomend I buy it?

Well, with Checkmate! I think that some of the songs are not really Namie's style, pretty much all of them except the 4 new ones. But even so Zeebra and m-flo (Verbal) are pretty popular in Japan in terms of hip-hop, but not exactly the target of this album. Anyway, it's hard to make a collaboration with someone as big as Namie and from the same music genre.

Anonymous said...

I think the main point with Checkmate! is that fans can get the songs Namie featured on without having to buy Zeebra's, M-flo's or Heartsdales' albums.

Fans of Zeebra etc already have those songs, because they bought the albums. Hence, they don't have to buy this album as well.

Anonymous said...

@ cipy. Yes!!!! Well recommended go and buy it awesome album also considering that the album sold. 2 million copies also as of rank was at #1 for 6 weeks in a roll 1st female artist to active since 1979 check it ;)

Anonymous said...

I kind of wish she had saved those new collaborations she did for the album for a different CD. The thing that made this CD so strange to me was that it was other artists collaborating with Amuro for most of the tracks instead of the other way around. All the tracks except for the new ones were _____ feat. Amuro Namie. In my opinion, most collaboration albums would be like the Suite Chic album where the "main" artist is featuring someone else for the tracks. From the start, it kinda sounded like her label wanted to make more money off of her popularity, so they are pumping out merchandise as much as they can >_< which is understandable. I just wonder how the other artists felt about having "their" songs put on another CD, even though they aren't in competition, it must be a touchy subject right?

Anonymous said...

I'm sure they all get some royalties for having their songs on this album. Since most of the songs are not Namie's songs, her company most likely had to buy the rights to use the songs on Checkmate.

Cipy said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Cipy said...

In most cases there are agreements beforehand. Usually all artist that collaborated get the right to use the song. Namie already used some of the songs in her tours and also she performed in m-flo's tour and also Zeebra's. I don't think there are any problems with this issue.

Anonymous said...

Let me sum this up, there was a huge Earthquake in Japan, I'm sure most people have to budget themselves on what they buy now, especially if they got some property damage. Lets use the US for example, we are in an economic crises, and everyone is rethinking on what they are about to buy, unless money comes out your ass. so people may now look at a compilation album and not buy it unless they are mega fans, which is wierd but understandable because from the sales I've seen they do extremely well in Japan, thus BEST FICTION did that great, now since the album came out around the time the earthquake hit, people are probably thinking, "I already own most of this on singles and albums, why put out more money for 4 new songs I can easily download off itunes or the internet" and also, they may not want to buy an entire album if they don't like even just one artist on there. where as if they had the extra money they might have ignored the song and got the album. I honestly don't see her tour doing that well either, not until Japan has fully recovered.

kiyoikou said...

^ Agree. We have to look at the situation comprehensively. The road to recovery is only beginning.