TEA

ANYONE FOR TEA? Hey kids, it’s triangulation time again! As the singles chart below makes readily apparent, Robin Thicke and his homies are killing it. “Blurred Lines” contributed the equivalent of 42.4k+ albums to IGA’s tally, lifting the company from #5 in both new-release and overall shares to #3 with TEA. Of course, that mega-smash had more than a hockey assist from Imagine Dragons (on KidinaKorner/Interscope) and the surging OneRepublic, which added a combined 34.3k in TEA, for a grand total of 76.7k to the actual album sales on the #10 Dragons (25.6k), #16 OneRepublic (20.6k) and #27 Gatsby (12.1k). Pulling out the trusty old abacus, we come up with 168.3k from this grouping alone. Nice—but that won’t top a big album debut, which is why IDJ is ahead of its West Coast sister label in terms of all three marketshare measurements. By the same token, a big debut album plus an ongoing hit LP will put you on top most of the time, which is where Columbia is perched on the three weekly charts. Nope, this ain’t rocket science, just simple addition. Pulling back to view the year as a whole, the numbers are somewhat less glowing, though they appear to be moving sluggishly in the right direction. According to our resident rain man, Album sales were up 5% vs. last week, down 7% vs. same week last year and down 5% (or 7.7m units) year to date. Track sales were up 3% vs. last week, up 5% vs. same week last year and down 2% (or a distressing 15.8m units) on the year. TEA sales were up 4% vs. last week, down 3% vs. same week last year and down 4% (or 9.3m units) YTD. (6/27a)