Kanye West’s ‘Ye’ Equalled A Billboard Chart Record Held By The Beatles

The chaotic lead-up to Kanye West‘s latest album brought anger, confusion, intense disappointment, and the threat of boycotts.

The aftermath? Yet another Billboard #1 hit.

Yeezy’s latest work, the beguiling seven-track album ye, officially debuted on the Billboard 200 chart in first place, cementing itself as the rapper’s eighth #1 record in a row.

That puts him in pretty distinguished territory: only Eminem and The Beatles have notched eight #1 albums consecutively.

ye sold the equivalent of 208,000 album units in the week ending June 7, even though only 85,000 of those sales were traditional album purchases.

Billboard counts 1,500 full album streams as a ‘Streaming Equivalent Album’. That means ye‘s seven tracks were streamed a cool 180.1 million times.

Keep in mind that The Beatles amassed 19 #1 records in their time, just not in a streak. JAY-Z also stands above his other rap contemporaries with a stunning 15 #1 albums in total.

Despite criticism of his latest work as half-baked in comparison to his earlier classics, it seems likely Kanye will only continue to rack up those #1s in the future: very rarely does a generational talent piss off and enamour so many people all at once.

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