Guns n’ Roses `Chinese Democracy` had a relatively lukewarm first day of sales in Australia with stores registering 3,454 sales on Friday, the day before the album`s official release.
The release date for music in Australia is Saturday (the start of the new ARIA chart week) but it has become standard for stores to break embargos and sell major releases as soon as they receive them.Albums by AC/DC, Metallica, Pink and Kings of Leon were all sold early by stores but sales prior to an official release date are not recognized for the ARIA chart.
By breaking embargo, stores sold 4,751 units of Kings of Leon ‘Only By The Night’ early. Metallica ‘Death Magnetic’ did 4,849 units, Pink did 7,120 and AC/DC sold 7,265 pre-official release. All of these albums debuted in the Top 5 on the early figures.
The 3,454 figure for `Chinese Democracy` was only enough to make it the 20th biggest album of the week.
There is a lot of anticipation for `Chinese Democracy` considering the 15-year wait fans have had for the release.
Reviews for the album have been overall positive. My personal opinion is that it is a good album, not a great album by Guns n’ Roses standards, but in the defense of Axl Rose, this is not really a Guns n’ Roses album. Take away the Gunners name and it is pretty, damn impressive, especially the tracks ‘Chinese Democracy’, ‘Madagascar’ and ‘I.R.S’.
American first days sales will be interesting. The album went on sale on Sunday in the United States. The US chart starts from Tuesday, so two days of sales will be counted towards the American chart, due on Thursday.
The top 5 biggest selling albums in the USA so far this year are:
1. Lil Wayne : The Carter III (2,671,816 units)
2. Coldplay : Viva La Vida (1,905,679 units)
3. Kid Rock : Rock N Roll Jesus (1,712,661 units
4. Jack Johnson : Sleep Through The Static (1,437,691 units)
5. AC/DC : Black Ice (1,319,914 units)
