Beyoncé‘s surprise self-titled new album has become the fastest selling album ever on iTunes worldwide with 828,773 copies sold in just three days. Most of these sales were in the US where Queen Bey also broke first week album sales records, selling up 617,213 copies since the album’s release on Friday.
Beyoncé is the singer’s fifth studio release and was dropped totally unannounced and exclusively on iTunes last Friday. The record is described as a “visual album” and contains 14 tracks, packaged with a total of 17 accompanying videos. Apple reports Beyoncé has reached number one in 104 countries.
The swift success of the record was fuelled by the secrecy of the release, a major feat by the star and her team to keep a project of this size from leaking. Buzzfeed reports director Ricky Saiz who shot the clip for the track Yoncé, said he had “no idea” of the scale of the project until it was released. “It was a complete surprise even to the people involved,” he said. “To be honest, I was actually in bed when I got an email just kind of saying [the album] was live.”
“I proceeded to stay up until 5 or 6 in the morning just kinda checking out all of the madness,” continued Saiz. “No one knew when [it would be released] or to what scale or that there was going to be everything coming out at once. It was very, very much a cool surprise.”
But it was the album’s unique concept, dominated by its visual content, that no doubt also drove fans to the online store, while their inability to purchase individual tracks meant customers had no option but to pay for the album in full.
The BBC reports that Apple’s iTunes has exclusive access to the album for about a week and physical copies of the record are expected in shops just in time for Christmas. If you’re not already one of the 828,773, and let’s face it you should be, Beyoncé is available through iTunes right now.
Watch: Beyoncé – Drunk in Love (Explicit) ft. JAY Z
