Dancehall princess Shenseea continues to break records at her own pace as her debut album Alpha leads the charge as the most streamed project by a dancehall artist this year in the US. The Interscope/Rich Immigrants set released March 11 has so far earned 60,000 equivalent album units (SEA,TEA) according data provided to World Music Views by Billboard sales tracker Luminate.
Of that sum, album sales comprise 1300, equaling 90 million on-demand official streams of the set’s 15 tracks including “Up Next Shenseea” outro.
The data compiled by Luminate is based on multi-metric consumption as measured in equivalent album units. Units comprise album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA). Each unit equals one album sale, or 10 individual tracks sold from an album, or 3,750 ad-supported or 1,250 paid/subscription on-demand official audio and video streams generated by songs from an album.
Alpha sold 4,900 units total from sales and streaming in the United States in its first week of release, according to data provided to World Music Views by Luminate. This included 800 copies in pure album sales.
Her first single from the album “Blessed” featuring Tyga is certified Gold in Canada for selling 40,000 units in that country.
Speaking about that achievement to World Music Views Shenseea says, “Thank you to God, my shenyengz and my team. I am blessed.”
Blessed was produced by Rvssian and co-written by Shenseea, Theron Thomas, Sam Sumser, Sean Small, and Stephen ‘Di Genius’ McGregor and the music video has surpassed 60 million views on YouTube.
It also peaked at No. 33 on the Rhythmic Audience chart and No. 37 on the Rhythmic Airplay chart.
Throughout the year the album occupied number 1 positions on Apple music in Antigua and Barbuda, Guyana, Seychelles and holds the number 2 position in Belize, Cayman Islands, Grenada, Jamaica and St. Lucia.
“Can’t Anymore”, a song on the album produced by London on The Track peaked at number 1 in the Cayman islands, and Dominica.
Shenseea benefitted from Apple music’s entry into the Caribbean last year with the Henkel Glue singer being Apple’s Next Up artist ahead of her album release, she did an interview with the platform to boost her streams and bring awareness to the project. Shenseea told Nadeska of Apple Music “It feels like this is the moment I have been waiting for all my life”.
Last year Shenseea made her Billboard Hot 100 and Spotify US and Global debut after her Kanye West Donda featuring Pure Souls charted at no. 22 and “OK OK pt 2” charted at no. 51. Globally on Spotify, Pure Souls charted at no. 50 and OK OK pt 2 peaked at 108. She was the first Jamaican artist to make the weekly chart in 5 years.
She is credited as “C. Lee” on both songs as a writer.
The 26 year old became the first female Jamaican Dancehall artist to hit the Hot 100 in 17 years, following Miss Ting’s entry with Beenie Man on the Dave Kelly-written Dude in 2004. Pure Souls with Roddy Rich, debuted at No. 52 on the Billboard Hot 100 and the tracks OK OK and OK OK pt2 were merged as one song for chart purposes and it came it at no. 12 according to data provided to WMV by Luminate.
The feat places the Trick Or Treat singer among other Dancehall women like Lady Saw and Patra who have hit the chart.
What’s more, Shenseea joins an even more elite group of Dancehall artists—which includes Sean Paul and Shaggy—to have two Billboard Hot 100 entries in the same week.
At the time she commented that she isn’t moved by her achievement, “Guys, I really don’t aspire to be the first of everything, it’s so annoying. The first of this, the first of that…who the f–k cares?” she told her fans in her Instagram Stories today. “I just wanna make my money, make my music, make my Shenyengs happy…my ultimate life goal is to be so wealthy that I will never go broke again…my kids will never go broke again.”
The Trick Or Treat singer’s debut album gets the better of other dancehall releases over the last year by Spice, Masicka, Sean Paul and others but it was Koffee who lead the charge for most streamed album by a Jamaican artist released this year.
World Music Views reported on Friday November 11, that Koffee’s debut album Gifted is the most streamed reggae album released this year.
In a year when more than 100 reggae albums were released, Koffee’s – “Gifted” Album is the most commercially successful new project by a reggae act in the US according to data provided to WMV by Billboard sales trackers Luminate.
The album released March 25, has so far clocked 223,000 album equivalent units(with SEA, and with TEA).This includes pure album sales of 1,600 (equalling total on-demand streams (audio + video) of 340 million.)
The Colombia/RCA recording release debuted at number 2 on the Reggae Billboard chart on the week of April 5 with 3500 total units sold in the US in the first week according to Luminate. At the time the album did 700 in total album sales with 3,290,800 streams in one week. Koffee’s “Gifted” also debuted at number 9 on the UK top 100 albums chart.
The album landed at number 5 on the UK physical albums chart and that gave Koffee the distinction of being the first female Jamaican to make the UK albums chart top ten.
Other women of Jamaican descent to have climbed the UK albums chart are Stefflon Don and Diana King.
Gifted also landed at No. 11 on the Billboard Heatseekers Albums chart, which ranks the sales by new and developing musical recording artists each week.
The UK’s Top 100 biggest artist albums of the week is compiled by the Official Charts Company, based on sales of CDs, downloads, vinyl and weighted audio streams.
Stay tuned to WMV as your trusted source since 2018 for official chart data and updates.
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