Travis Scott’s ‘UTOPIA’ is the biggest hip hop release of 2023 so far

Travis Scott has broken records with his fourth studio album, “UTOPIA”, which was already considered the biggest hip-hop release of the year so far.

On July 28, the Houston rapper unveiled his long-awaited album, featuring Beyoncé, Teezo Touchdown, Drake and other artists. This follows the rapper’s third album, “Astroworld”, which was nominated for the Grammy Awards.

UTOPIA has broken many records since its release. In its first week, the album sold 496,000 units and collected more than 650 million streams worldwide, topping the charts in 17 countries. This follows the success of Lil Uzi Vert’s “The Pink Tape,” which was the top-charting hip-hop album before “UTOPIA,” which sold 167,000 units in its first week.

Physical sales of the album reached 252,000 units, making it the second highest selling physical album in the first week of this year. “Speak Now (Taylor’s Version)” by Taylor Swift has the highest first-week sales of 2023 so far with 716,000 equivalent album units, including 507,000 album sales.

In addition, Apple Music and Spotify claim that the album achieved the highest number of first-day streams for an album in 2023 on the platform. The latter confirmed that the record was played 128 million times on its first day and 79 million on its second day, which is more than the first day of any other rap album in 2023. According to Hot New Hip Hop, ‘MELTDOWN’, with the Drake collaboration, currently accounting for 10% of all ‘UTOPIA’ streams.

In a three-star review of the record, NME said: “While ‘Astroworld’ was the perfect theme for Scott’s music… his quest to tackle a lofty concept like finding utopia, his ambitions brought him back to a there was much more. great about it.”

To accompany the album, Scott, 32, announced a special one-off performance at the Giza pyramids in Egypt, which was ultimately canceled due to production issues. Instead, Scott performed at the iconic Circus Maximus in Rome, Italy earlier this week (August 7). The 60,000 concert tickets were sold in two days. On stage, he brought out his mentor Kanye West to sing “Praise God” and “Can’t Tell Me Nothing.”

CIRCUS MAXIMUS also performed in support of “UTOPIA.” Written and co-directed by Travis Scott, the film opened on July 31 in sold-out theaters across the United States.

Last month, despite the cancellation of the concert, fans held a party in Egypt, at the pyramids, in honor of the release of “UTOPIA”.

This week, after endless messages and comments from fans, singer KayCyy shared his frustrations at not being credited as a featured artist on ‘Thank You’.