BLACKPINK: not only in our area, once again – but also making history while doing so.
The unstoppable foursome – individually Jennie, Lisa, Jisoo and Rosé – have debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 as of this week with their formal debut, The Album. (If you missed it, heres are my thoughts about the record.)
The album, The Album (“as you know, my single ‘My Single Is Dropping’ is dropping”), moved 110,000 equivalent album units in its first week, marking the highest first-week sales for a debut album by a K-pop group in music history.
It’s also the biggest chart debut by an all-female group in over 12 years since Danity Kane‘s Welcome to the Dollhouse in March of 2008. (!)
And “Ice Cream (feat. Selena Gomez),” their first-ever Billboard Hot 100 Top 20 single, is also still performing well: the song shot to the No. 20 spot on Top 40 radio this week. And they’ve got a “Lovesick Girls” music video scandal to boot!
“Some bitches you can’t manage,” indeed.
For anyone else who loves international pop – all the fellow music nerds who spent their early youth spending all their coins on pricey imports, researching DVD region codes, and excitedly chatting in niche fan forums – this is yet another victory in the continued demise of the barriers that once restricted the visibility of global music.
This is also a huge win for the fellow girl group enthusiasts: it’s taken over a decade to finally see another girl group reign supreme to this degree, and it’s more than about time for the girl group love to take over the charts again.
There’s even more to be excited about just ahead as well this month for the ever-loyal BLINKs, including Light Up the Sky, the Netflix documentary arriving on October 14. And judging by the trailer, it’s going to be good.
The Album is available in four different CD versions.
This album is featured on the MuuTunes Spotify playlist.
You can also subscribe to MuuTunes on Apple Music.
Photo credit: YG Entertainment
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