YTD MARKETSHARE: BLUEBLOODS AND
NEW BLOOD

Due to the absence of superstar releases—apart from one album available only with the purchase of a dedicated $200 stem player—our first taste of 2022 features a whole lot of strong carryovers from 2021. The four top labels in overall marketshare haven’t budged, and 34 of last year’s Top 50 albums are still hanging around more than two months into this year. In fact, the only 2022 releases on the chart are from Elektra’s Gunna (#2), XO/Republic’s The Weeknd (#3), Atlantic’s YoungBoy NBA (a mixtape, #11) and Monument’s Walker Hayes (#31).

Amid the perennial powers, however, an upstart is shaking up the early-2022 action: Disney’s Encanto soundtrack, released in mid-November, is the blockbuster nobody saw coming. The album is the biggest of the year by more than 330k units, and six of its seven Lin-Manuel Miranda-penned songs are Top 25 YTD, with #1 “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” one of three tracks in the Top 10. Encanto’s performance—bolstered by a best-of from Queen, a three-decade-old gift from Peter Paterno that keeps on giving—has lifted the Ken Bunt-led music group to a 2% share, good for #11 in the standings.

Interscope Geffen A&M started off last year with a bang, launching the music career of Olivia Rodrigo, who helped propel John Janick’s squad to its second straight marketshare chip. The race is tighter in the early going this year, thanks to Atlantic’s successes with Gunna and YoungBoy—two of its five Top 50 albums—but the staying power of Rodrigo, the late Juice WRLD (with no less than four charting LPs), Billie Eilish, Eminem, Summer Walker and Moneybagg Yo, combined with the Super Bowl-driven reactivation of hip-hop classics from Kendrick Lamar and 2PAC, has given IGA 13 of the Top 50 albums.

Republic also came out of the gate at full gallop in 2021, unleashing Morgan Wallen’s Dangerous, the year’s biggest album, in tandem with Big Loud, leading Monte Lipman’s hitmaking machine to another #3 finish. Wallen, Drake, Taylor Swift and a deuce from The Weeknd give Republic 50% of the leaderboard, with 10 on the Top 50 chart. Among the company’s nine Top 50 songs are #5 “Heat Waves” from Glass Animals—which recently completed its two-year journey to the top of the singles chart—and #15 “Fingers Crossed” from newcomer Lauren Spencer-Smith, who signed with Imran Majid and Justin Eshak’s Island in February.

Ron Perry’s Columbia, coming off an extended hot streak, holds serve at #4, thanks to a potent cocktail of next-gen power hitters The Kid LAROI, Lil Nas X and Polo G and Big Red core artists Adele and Harry Styles.

Coming off Dua Lipa’s breakthrough year, Warner Records moves up a notch to #5 in the marketshare standings with an eclectic batch of hit acts that also includes Fleetwood Mac, whose evergreen Rumours tops the Vinyl Albums chart; The Walters, signed by Aaron Bay-Schuck last fall; and Cody Johnson from Espo’s Warner Music Nashville. Meanwhile, Tom Corson has lowered his handicap to 84.

The Bunny has slid past Capitol Music Group, as Michelle Jubelirer oversees a renovation of the Tower hierarchy, with Virgin President Jacqueline Saturn a key contributor.

Deeper in the early-season standings, Brad Navin’s The Orchard is up to 5.6%, Doja Cat is lighting the scoreboard for Peter Edge’s RCA and Tunji Balogun has started his restoration of Def Jam. In the Southern Regional bracket, Mike Dungan and Cindy Mabe’s UMG Nashville and Randy Goodman’s Sony Music Nashville continue their fierce back-and-forth rivalry—the country-music equivalent of Duke vs. North Carolina. Watch this space for updated scores, stats and standings.