Almost a year ago, Billboard published a story analyzing whether or not Katy Perry’s “Teenage Dream” album had met its first-week sales expectations. In the weeks leading up to the album’s release, Perry seemed omnipresent, and industry SoundScan prognisticators were projecting first week sales of 300,000 units to 700,000 units. EMI had shipped a million units in anticipation of a big first week and they weren’t alone in their optimism.
But when the album only scanned 192,000 units in the debut week, according to Nielsen SoundScan, the entire industry, not just EMI, was shocked.
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That story ended on this note: “Mark my words: I will bet you ‘Teenage Dream’ will sell more than [Perry’s debut, ‘One of the Boys’]. ‘Teenage Dream’ will be one of those ‘at the end of the day’ records,” a senior label exec said.
As it turns out, “Teenage Dreams is indeed one of those “at the end of the day” records. For the week ending Aug. 14, the album has scanned a few units shy of 1.7 million units, as compared to her first Capitol album “One Of The Boys,” which has scanned 1.4 million units.
But album sales aren’t the only story going on here. As Capitol Records has proclaimed: “ Katy Perry ties with Michael Jackson to become the second artist in the 53-year-history of the Hot 100 chart to produce five No. 1 singles off the same album,” in this case “Teenage Dream.”
Those five singles are “California Gurls,” which in all of its versions has scanned 4.92 million units; “Firework,” which has scanned 4.8 million units. “E.T.,” in all of its versions, has scanned nearly 4.6 million units; “Teenage Dream,” which in all of its versions has scanned 3.9 million units and “Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.),” which has scanned 2 million units.
Those five songs combined have scanned nearly 20.2 million units and all the tracks on the album have scanned 20.9 million units. If you convert those track scans to track-equivalent albums, that comes out to another 2.09 million units. That means that “Teenage Dreams” has scanned a whopping 3.8 million albums and track equivalents.
Now, the only question remains, will Capitol be tempted to release “Peacock” as the next single in an attempt to reach six Hot 100 No. 1 singles. That track has the best sales of the remaining songs on the album, having scanned 388,000 units to date.