The Empyrean is on Heatseekers’ List and more…
This is a bunch of interesting curiosities; and though The Empyrean was probably not meant to be super-successful in “commercial” terms, it’s getting more successful than all of the previous John’s solo albums; despite being barely promoted, not yet reviewed by half of the mainstream press and reliable sites for reviews (e.g. Rolling Stone, Pitchfork) and, of course, without any singles and videos. I hope that this list is not offensive in any way, as it’s pretty cool to know these things.
The Heatseekers’ list for 07th February 2009 published by Billboard has The Empyrean on 7th place and also marked as a “hot shot”. You can see the list here. As far as the overall Billboard top 200 is concerned, the album peeked at #190, which is one spot higher than Shadows Collide With People nearly five years ago.
On iTunes, The Empyrean was in top 10 on the day it was digitally released and right now, in the most of the bigger countries, it’s under What’s Hot?, next to new releases by Bon Iver and Antony & The Johnsons.
On Amazon.com, things vary, but the album is constantly in top 100, often in top 50 as well, and it’s ranking amongst top 5 under Oldies & Retro, Indie Rock and, of course, Psychedelic Rock. You can check top 100 albums at any time, and the list is updated hourly. Also, if you want to save in the days of recession, they offer a 25% discount on the normal version of the album.
The situation isn’t much different on Amazon.co.uk, where the album is, according to some people, already out of stock, despite what is said on the site…?!
On Amazon.de, the album is in top 100 constantly…however, the release date has been pushed from 30th January to 03rd February.
The LP is also in top 1000 on UK and USA Amazon sites and the mp3 album is currently not doing that well, but it was #38 on the day when it came out and in top 50 until the physical release of the album came out. Before The Beginning appears to be the most wanted mp3 download out of some 80 JF songs available over there.
Unreachable is the top rising track for the week ending with 25th January on Last.fm. Perhaps you can still see it there if you hurry up, as the weekly cut off for these tracks is Sunday 00:00 GMT. Click here!
Many thanks to Creu, Eleni, Yehan and Ivan – as well as a bunch of disappointed Germans – for helping me compile this data. If you have another curiosity for this page or if the album has made it to charts in your country; that would be interesting to know.
