S. Samuel
Grammy-winning rappers Jay-Z and Kanye West's Watch the Throne first-week album sales projections have been revealed showing the duo's long-awaited LP selling up to 450,000 units.
Based on one-day estimates, the new LP will easily debut on next week’s sales chart.
Jay-Z and Kanye West’s Roc-a-Fella/Def Jam/Roc Nation release Watch the Throne hit iTunes last night for a four-day exclusive, and predictably, the deluxe edition of the album and the regular are running 1-2 on the site. The physical version hits retail on Friday, with Best Buy the exclusive physical outlet for the deluxe edition, which includes four extra bonus tracks. In addition, it was the first major hip-hop release in memory to hit the market without a leak, perhaps due to its digital-only release up front. Early returns suggest that the album’s first-week total on next Tuesday’s chart will be right in line with the initial estimate of 400-450k. (HITS Daily Double)
While the project released exclusively via iTunes on Monday (August 8), it will hit additional retail outlets later this week.
“Watch the Throne,” which miraculously didn’t leak to the Web as so many eagerly-awaited albums have over the years, is exclusive to iTunes until Friday, Aug. 12. That’s when all other retailers — physical and digital — will start selling “Watch.” Of course, most brick-and-mortar retailers could opt to ignore the official street date and begin selling the CD as soon as they receive it, which may be as early as Wednesday. (Billboard)
This week, Def Jam’s Director of Digital Marketing Jycorri Robinson talked about the project’s inability to leak.
“Kanye and Jay are just very tight with the music,” he explained in an interview “Even so far as to where they’ve been, Kanye and Jay have been at every listening session, every event, that there has been and that’s because they’re holding that music so tight to them. There hasn’t been [any] copies floating around the [DefJam] office ’cause that shit is in a vault. They just took it back to the old school, man. They recorded the entire album together; no verses emailed back and forth. It’s just tight eyes on it, only one or two people having access to it.” (XXL Mag)
A few days ago, Jay’s manager John Meneilly promised the LP would not leak.
With less than a week to go before Watch the Throne hits iTunes, don’t expect any leaks. Those hoping to get their hands on Jay-Z and Kanye West’s collaborative album early are in for disappointment. “It is not going to leak,” tweeted a confident John Meneilly, Jay-Z’s manager. In order to prevent the album from leaking in advance, digital and physical release dates were staggered. (Rap-Up)
Check out the album teaser below:
