Katy Perry’s “Teenage Dream” Sales Require Some Analysis

Katy Perry has ruled the airwaves this summer and seemed poised to take over the Billboard charts with the release of her sophomore album Teenage Dream.

And yet, with the first week’s sales reporting in, Perry’s album has reportedly sold 192,000 copies. And I’ll bet you’re wondering where the problem is.

Don’t get me wrong, that’s a very large number and her album topped the charts for the week. But consider that Eminem’s newest album Recovery sold 741,000 in its first week. Drake’s Thank Me Later sold 447,000. Kanye West’s 2008 album 808’s & Hearbreaks showed first week sales of 450,145 copies. Even Justin Beiber’s March release of My World 2.0 sold 283,000 in week #1. All three of these artists receive a decent amount of radio play, possibly even LESS than Perry, and yet their sales top hers. Really, it seems really ridiculous that Teenage Dream failed to sell more than 200,000 copies in its first week.

But at the same time, Katy’s seen a better opening week than comparable female pop artists. Ke$ha’s Animal netted a first week sale of 152,000 copies. Christina Aguilera’s Bionic sold 110,000 copies. Miley Cyrus’ Can’t Be Tamed came in at 102,000 copies after the first week. Pink’s Funhouse saw first week sales of 180,000 copies. Even Lady Gaga’s The Fame Monster only sold 174,000 copies it’s first week on the charts (however, it should be noted that the deluxe 2 Disc edition went on sale the first day and sold 151,000, putting TFM’s total sales closer to 325,000 copies for the first week).

In fact, about the only exceptions to this trend of young female pop artists selling poorly in the first week are Britney Spears (Circus sold 505,000 in week 1) and Beyonce (her 2008 album I Am…Sasha Fierce sold 482,000 copies its first week).

But you know, I am (surprisingly) not going to make this entirely about gender. Because while I think it’s not entirely a coincidence that female artists aren’t selling as well as their male counterparts, there’s a bigger issue here.

Really, it’s not a question of Katy Perry or these other artists not selling WELL, but not selling to expectations. Maybe, just maybe, the expectations of the music industry need to change.

We’re not a market that necessarily buys albums anymore. With digital distribution and the ability to selectively buy singles, there’s not really a huge need to buy albums anymore…until the album has been out, you’ve had a chance to hear it and decided if you’re going to buy the rest of it or not. While some bands are helping this buy allowing people to stream their albums early via Myspace, Facebook, MTV.com or a number of other sites, that only helps if you have an album that the fans are going to want to buy. Add to that internet piracy and people may have an entire album in their hands by the time the actual physical copy drops and have already decided they don’t want to give the artist money for the product, for whatever reason.

The question becomes: do record sales, especially first week sales, even really matter anymore? Can we seriously continue to use them to measure the success of an artist?

Katy Perry’s album didn’t debut with gold status (selling 500,000 copies). But I doubt she or her fans are really going to bat an eyelash about it. She’s currently everywhere, performing on TV, playing on the radio and I’m sure at some point in the near future we’ll be hearing about a tour. She’s on top of the world…and all that with “disappointing” album sales. Which, I think, is pretty much proof positive that album sales don’t mean what they used to.