Taylor Swift's “Tortured Poets Department” enters 15th week on Billboard 200

By Taylor Swift Department of Tormented Poets reaches 15th week atop the Billboard 200 chart (dated August 24) — tying Carole King's Tapestry for a third week at No. 1 among women's albums. The latter spent 15 frames at No.1 in 1971. Only Adele's 21 (24 weeks in 2011-12) and the Whitney Houston soundtrack to The Bodyguard (20 weeks in 1992-93) have more weeks at No. 1 among women.

Tormented Poets earned 85,000 equivalent US album units in the week ending Aug. 15 (down 40%), according to Luminate.

Meanwhile, in a quiet top 10 (where no album debuts for the second time in three weeks), Chappell Roan The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess marks a new high for a third straight week as it climbs 3-2 with 72,000 units (up 13%), a new weekly unit high for the set.

The Billboard 200 chart ranks the most popular albums of the week in the US based on multimetric consumption as measured in equivalent album units, compiled by Luminate. Units include album sales, track album equivalents (TEA) and streaming album equivalents (SEA). Each unit equals one album sale or 10 individual tracks sold from an album or 3,750 ad-supported or 1,250 official paid/subscription audio and video streams generated from songs from an album. The new chart dated August 24, 2024 will be fully posted on Bulletin boardon the user's website on August 20. For all the new charts, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both X, formerly known as Twitter, and Instagram.

Of Department of Tormented PoetsOf the 85,000 units earned in the week ending August 15, SEA units comprise 57,000 (down 1%, equivalent to 74.77 official on-demand streams of the 31-song widely available deluxe edition of the set), sales album is 28,000% and below TEA units are a negligible amount (5% increase). In the chart of top streaming albums, Poets falls 2-3 and on the Top Sales album chart, it's in its eighth week at No. 1.

With Tortured Poets — Swift's longest-running album on the Billboard 200 — adds to her 84th career week at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, extending her record among solo artists. (Elvis Presley has the second most among soloists, with 67.) The total includes her 14 No. 1 albums. (She is tied with Jay-Z for the most No. 1s among solo artists.)

In the follow-up week of August 9-15, news continued to emerge of the failed terrorist attack on Swift's canceled Eras tour dates in Vienna. The three Vienna dates (August 8–10) were canceled on August 7 and were the first canceled shows of the tour, which began on March 17, 2023. On August 15, the tour resumed its scheduled five-night stop at London's Wembley Stadium (August 15-17, August 19-20), for the final shows of The Eras tour in Europe.

During the final day (August 15) of the chart's tracking week, Swift unveiled a brand new digital album variant of Poets on its official online store, which was available for six hours and sold for $4.99. The set included the 16 songs from the standard album, plus an exclusive bonus track, “The Prophecy (Long Story Short – Live From Lyon),” recorded during The Eras tour on June 2.

Also, on Aug. 15, for six hours only, Swift's online store brought back a $4.99 digital album variant that was briefly available the previous tracking week — featuring the standard album's 16 songs plus a live version of “thank You aimEe (Mean – Live from London ),” recorded on June 22 during The Eras tour. The following week, the same digital album variant was sold on Swift's online store, but with a slight difference – the standardization of the letters in title of the live bonus track. It was originally stylized as “thank you aIMee” (mirroring the studio version on Poets album), and then on August 15, his style was changed to “thank You aimEe”. The capitalization of the specific letters in the title — KIM and YE — could refer to Kim Kardashian and her ex-husband (and Swift's longtime nemesis), Ye, formerly Kanye West.

In the monitoring week ending August 15, Tormented Poets sold nearly 10,000 in digital album downloads in all variants through all retailers (including her website, the iTunes Store, and others). Even if Poets had not sold a single digital album in the final tracking week, it would still be No. 1 on the Billboard 200. The No. 2 title, Chappell Roan's The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princesspaths Poets by 13,000 units.

As for The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princessthe album hits a new high for a third week in a row as it steps 3-2 with 72,000 equivalent album units earned (its best week per units earned, up 13%). Over the past 10 weeks, the album has been steadily climbing the chart. It broke into the top 10 on the chart dated June 22, climbing 12-10. Since then it has moved 8-6-5-5-7-8-4-3-2.

The rise 3-2 for Increase reflects the follow-up week that featured an intense festival performance from Roan — her Aug. 11 concert at Outside Lands in San Francisco. The latter created a near-viral moment where she criticized the VIP section for not singing along to “Hot To Go!” of the album.

Morgan Wallen's top chart One thing at a time falls 4-3 on the latest Billboard 200 with 63,000 equivalent album units gained (up 1%). It also claims a ninth consecutive week at No. 1 on the Top Streaming Albums chart.

By Billie Eilish Hit with hard and soft steps 5-4 on the Billboard 200 with 57,000 (up 1%), while Zach Bryan The Great American Bar Scene climbs 7-5 with 48,000 (though down 6%).

Charli XCX's Brat is unmoved at No. 6 (47,000, down 16%). By Noah Kahan Stick Season steps 9-7 (just over 38,000, up 3%). Wallen's former No. 1 Dangerous: The Double album is still at No. 8 (38,000, up 2%). Twisters: The album up 10-9 (34,000, down 7%). and Zach Bryan's chart-topper of the same name returns to the top 10, climbing 12-10 (nearly 34,000, up 6%).

Luminate, the independent data provider at Bulletin board charts, completes a thorough review of all data submissions used to compile the weekly chart rankings. Luminate reviews and data authentication. In collaboration with Bulletin boarddata considered suspicious or unverifiable are removed, using established criteria, before final chart calculations are made and published.