Worthing rock duo Royal Blood maintain their 100% record on the album chart, with their fourth studio set, Back To The Water Below, debuting at No.1 on consumption of 18,856 units (9,435 CDs, 6,384 vinyl albums, 363 cassettes, 851 digital downloads and 1,824 sales-equivalent streams). It was No.1 on all metrics, apart from streaming, where it ranks 62nd.
Royal Blood’s eponymous debut sold 65,812 copies opening at No.1 in 2014; Follow-up How Did We Get So Dark sold 48,447 copies doing likewise in 2017; and Typhoons completed their hat trick, selling 31,962 copies as it topped the list in 2021.
Despite never having a Top 40 single, cumulative consumption of their albums exceeds one million units with Royal Blood selling 686,484 copies, How Did We Get So Dark selling 229,264 copies and Typhoons selling 100,835 copies. Their highest-charting track on the singles chart, Figure It Out, reached No.43 in 2014, and is by far their most-consumed track with a to-date tally of 855,808 units.
Popular Berkshire shoegaze band Slowdive released a trio of decreasingly successful albums for the revered Creation label in the 1990s and returned after a 22-year hiatus to score their first ever Top 20 album with an eponymous 2017 release that peaked at No.16 on consumption of 4,234 units. Six years on, they up the ante again with fifth album, Everything Is Alive, becoming their first Top 10 entry, debuting at No.6 on consumption of 5,828 units. A quintet formed in Reading in 1989, Slowdive released their first album, Just For A Day in 1991, and retain their original line-up of Neil Halstead, Rachel Goswell, Christian Savill, Simon Scott and Nick Chaplin, all 52 years old.
Ten years after it became the first of their five studio albums to reach No.1, The 1975’s eponymous 2013 debut has been released in expanded editions on CD, vinyl and cassette. Last in the Top 50 in 2016, it has previously spent only three weeks in the Top 10 (its first three) but returns to the upper echelons this week, jumping 105-3. Consumption of 7,283 copies in the latest frame lifts its cumulative sales to 800,117 units – more than the band’s two next most popular titles together.
Its consumption increasing 38.60% week-on-week to 7,921, Utopia rebounds 5-2 for Travis Scott, five weeks after debuting at No.1. Some 7,879 of that is sales-equivalent streams, alongside 32 CDs and 10 digital downloads.
The rest of the Top 10: I Told Them... (1-4, 7,191 sales) by Burna Boy, The Highlights (3-5, 6,908 sales) by The Weeknd, Midnights (4-7, 5,619 sales) by Taylor Swift, 50 Years: Don’t Stop (10-8, 5,492 sales) by Fleetwood Mac, Diamonds (11-9, 5,124 sales) by Elton John and Lover (12-10, 5,105 sales) by Taylor Swift.
Exiting the Top 10: 1989 (9-11, 5,092 sales) by Taylor Swift, Back To Square One (6-62, 2,062 sales) by Digga D, Euphoria (2-102, 1,536 sales) by Claire Richards plus two albums which depart the Top 200 - Road (889 sales) by Alice Cooper and Weedkiller by Ashnikko (827 sales), last week’s No.8 and No.7, respectively.
Icelandic trio Sigur Ros’ eighth studio album in a 26-year career, and their first release for 10 years, Átta debuts at No.30 (3,880 sales). Released digitally in June, it is their eighth Top 75 album.
Also new to the Top 75: All The Old 45s – The Very Best Of Deacon Blue (No.42, 2,480 sales), the latest compilation by the veteran Scots band released to tie-in with their UK tour and delivering their 15th chart album; and Rivers Of Heresy (No.46, 2,409 sales), the introductory release by Scots metal duo, Empire State Bastard.
Jethro Tull’s 14th studio album, The Broadsword And The Beast, debuted and peaked at No.27 in 1982, and makes its first chart appearance since (No.43, 2,462 sales) after being released in slightly late and extremely expansive 40th anniversary edition packages (5 CD/3 DVD and vinyl fourpack). In Germany, where the album originally peaked at No.14, it reaches a new peak this week, re-entering at No.4 to become their 14th Top 10 album, twice as many as they have had here.
Ed Sheeran’s latest album Subtract departed the Top 75 last week after a 17-week tenure. It is the lowest introductory run in the Top 75 of any of his seven full-length studio albums, and it descends even further this week, falling 76-91 (1,634 sales). That means it is far below two much older Sheeran albums, namely Divide, which levitates 32-29 (2,927 sales), and Equals, which rises 37-31 (2,704 sales). Divide has been in the Top 75 continuously since its 2017 release (340 weeks and counting, lowest position: 49), while Equals has racked up 97 consecutive weeks in the Top 40 since its chart-topping debut in 2021.
Following the campaign for Subtract – which debuted at No.1 on sales of 76,263 units but spent only 10 weeks in the Top 40 with to-date consumption of 155,841 units – Sheeran has announced quickfire follow-up, Autumn Variations, which is released in three weeks (September 29). Equals became his fourth album to achieve consumption of one million units three weeks ago, while 2019 release No.6 Collaborations Project becomes his fifth this week. Their current cumes: Equals - 1,010,320, and No.6... – 1,000,676.
Barbie The Album is No.1 on the compilation albums chart for the seventh week in a row, on consumption of 9,643 units (616 CDs, 218 vinyl albums, six cassettes, 103 digital downloads and 8,700 sales-equivalent streams).
Overall album sales are up 1.12% week-on-week at 2,123,921, 13.85% above same week 2022 sales of 1,865,464. Physical product accounts for 235,637 sales, 11.09% of the total.
