While it will rank as the week’s best-selling debut album in the US, Coldplay’s “A Head Full of Dreams” will post the band’s lowest first week mark since 2002’s “A Rush Of Blood To The Head.”
Based on opening day sales data, Hits Daily Double projects a first-week bow of 150-175,000 US sales. That represents a sharp fall from the 383,000 shifted by 2014’s “Ghost Stories.”
Prior to that, the band debuted with 447,000 copies for 2011’s “Mylo Xyloto,” 720,000 for 2008’s “Viva La Vida or Death And All His Friends,” and 737,000 for 2005’s “X&Y.”
The aforementioned “A Rush of Blood To The Head,” in fact, sold 144,000 US copies in its first week, so “Dreams” is only on track to slightly best that album’s performance.
There are numerous potential causes for the drop from 2014’s “Ghost Stories” (let alone the previous albums). The gap between releases is the shortest ever for a Coldplay studio album; “Ghost Stories” emerged just over a year-and-a-half ago. The lead time between album announcement and release was very short; too short, in fact, for an aggressive promotional campaign or for lead single “Adventure Of A Lifetime” to make a truly meaningful mark.
The band’s profile has also been shrinking; it still generates chart hits, but not since “Viva la Vida” has one achieved ubiquity.
On the other hand, the album was released in the normally lucrative holiday season. Its debut came a day after Coldplay received considerable press for being named the Super Bowl 50 Halftime Show. And it is still a Coldplay album — while not as hot as it was in the mid 2000s, the band is still one of the biggest in the world.
Coldplay’s album will be the week’s best-selling newcomers, but it presently has no chance of dethroning Adele’s “25” from atop the US album sales chart.
