Source: Beyonce / other
Surprising absolutely no one, Beyoncé is, once again, sitting pretty at the top of the charts.
The singer’s seventh solo effort, Renaissance, debuts at #1 on the Billboard 200 this week, selling 332,000 equivalent album units and 190,000 physical copies. As reported by Pitchfork, Queen Bey is now the first female artist in Billboard history to have her first seven solo albums debut at the top spot. The project, the first of three “acts” that she recorded over the pandemic, also marks the second-biggest debut of 2022. (She’s only behind Columbia labelmate Harry Styles, whose Harry’s House project debuted with 521,000 equivalent units in June.)
But WAIT! There’s more!
Renaissance also had the largest streaming week for an album by a woman in 2022 by on-demand official streams earned, with 179.06 million, according to Billboard. It also has the third-largest sales week in physical sales (and the largest by a female artist). Only the aforementioned Harry’s House (330,000) and Proof by K-Pop group BTS (266,000) sold more.
In other Beyoncé news…
Over the weekend, the “Queens Remix” of Renaissance’s first single, “Break My Soul,” was released. Featuring fellow music icon Madonna (and sampling her classic 1990 hit, “Vogue”), Bey gives a shoutout to fierce Black female artists of the past and present, including Nina Simone, Grace Jones, Aretha Franklin, Lauryn Hill, Sade, Lizzo, Tierra Whack, Chloe & Halle, and more. And of course, her sister Solange and Destiny’s Child bandmates Kelly Rowland & Michelle Williams get shoutouts too.
Check out “Break My Soul (The Queens Remix)” below!
