14 DAY TRIAL // Eminem came pretty close to selling $1 million copies of his “Recovery” album in the first week of release, but he didn’t quite hit the mark, falling short by 250,000 copies or so – and he’s had the best selling album of the year so far. Country darling Taylor Swift will certainly accomplish this when her next album comes out this summer, industry insiders say for Billboard magazine.
Swift has announced that she’s coming out with a new studio material in October. Called “Speak Now,” it will arrive in music stores on the 25th and will most likely take a page out of history books by moving an estimated 1 million copies in its first week, Will Botwin, president and CEO of Red Light Management and ATO Records, believes. After all, if anyone can do it, then Taylor is that person, Botwin says.
“It feels like if anybody can do it now, she could be the one. She has the sales base and heat from the last few albums. And with all the amazing things she has going on, she is as likely as anybody to reach a million units, especially with the efforts of Big Machine and Universal behind her. She has created mass appeal, she has a bigger profile than anybody in music,” Botwin says of Taylor and her appeal to the general public. Indeed, figures so far indicate that she is among the artists with the biggest number of fans – not just her age, but of all artists active on the scene right now.
“I am betting that as we get closer to the release date – with all the deals that Big Machine is probably working on falling into place – she will be so in our face everywhere we turn that she will hit the critical mass that could see a million-unit week. I don’t think she can get enough [radio] formats. She may have three-country, some AC depending on the song and maybe top 40. But that’s always the dilemma because there are not many slots for nonrhythmic music on top 40 radio in the major markets. I would still bet that she comes under a million units. It’s not our album, but I would be the first guy to stand up and cheer if it does happen,” Botwin further says.
Then again, Swift is no stranger to breaking records and setting new bars for herself and other artists in her league. At the beginning of the year, she released “Today Was a Fairytale” and it went on to be downloaded a record 325,000 times just in its first week, surpassing the previous holder, Britney Spears’ “Womanizer.”
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