Original Album Sales – French Discography – Comments
1991 Dion Chante Plamandon – 1,500,000
1995 D’Eux – 7,200,000
1998 S’Il Suffisait D’Aimer – 3,900,000
2003 1 Fille & 4 Types – 1,500,000
2007 D’Elles – 700,000
2012 Sans Attendre – 1,300,000
2016 Encore Un Soir – 800,000
If it is already difficult to create a successful discography, creating two is even harder. It gets even more incredible when you do it in such an incredible fashion.
In comparison to global albums, those figures may seem low. Some perspective is needed. From 1995 to date, the biggest selling album in the US is Come On Over by Shania Twain at more than 20 million copies sold. In the same time frame, the highest selling album in France – indeed, the highest selling album ever – is D’Eux by Celine Dion at 4,21 million, ironically an other Canadian female star. The difference? Given respective markets, 4,21 million in France equals to some 34 million units in the US, more than what Michael Jackson‘s Thriller did.
S’Il Suffisait D’Aimer sales of 3,9 million are nowhere near D’Eux, but still enough to put it among the Top 3 best selling French albums ever, which shows the absolute madness created by those records in France, Quebec, Wallonia and such regions.
All in all, those albums shipped 16,9 million units, with Encore Un Soir likely to quickly sell its current shipments and to get new and big orders during the Christmas season.
Her early french catalogue doing 3.5M seems rather excessive and I cant find these numbers being broken down until the final chart. Where do they come from?
How many copies have been sold in UK as of 2016？
It’s been around 5 years since Celine Dion has been updated. Encore Un Soir sales needs an update and she has a new album out already in 2019.
They seem never care about Celine’s numbers.
Let’s face it, she neither streams or sells fantastically well and hasn’t for many, many years now. So, why would we specifically concentrate on and update an artist that in all likelihood, has not really added a great amount to her 2016 total. On top of that, there are many other artists who have also not been updated since 2016, such as The Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, U2, Fleetwood Mac, Bon Jovi, ABBA etc and many from subsequent years, that have added more to their totals, in a shorter space of time. We get you are fans and mainly care… Read more »
You sound rude. I am just asking kindly. Encore Un Soir has sold more than 800k now and has released a new English studio album in 2019 that sold 500k in less than two months. It may be little to you, but a pretty update would make us happy.
I’d say blunt and honest, rather than rude and given that it was suggested that we do not (specifically) care about Celine Dions numbers, can you blame me?
No consideration was given to the fact that numerous artists (from 2016) have not been updated either, yet somehow it’s just Celines numbers we do not care about!
I agree with Martin. Celine is my favorite artist ever but she barely added what, 4 million tops since 2016? I would rather see new legends being studied, new big artists being studied or older artists that are streaming like hotcakes studied.
Thank you Pat. It just grates on us, that some fans have this perception that we are anti their favourite artist and call us out as such, just because their favourite has not been updated, since their original analysis. They fail to appreciate or more likely care (unlike yourself), that other acts, who have potentially added more to their totals, have also not been updated. Perversely, it almost always seems to be fans of female acts, that level these accusations at us. On top of all that, as MJD has stated many times, it is an extremely arduous process, that… Read more »
My favorite Celine Dion song was always “Think Twice”. As a European it baffles me that it flopped in many other parts of the world. As a UK #1 it barely made it to the Billboard Hot 100. Obviously it was included on the European version of “All the Way a Decade of Songs”, but not the US (and most other) versions. Today, on Spotify the song is NOT included on that album (not in my region anyway) – I suppose that could hurt it’s streaming results a bit. Then again neither is “All By Myself”, and that one’s doing… Read more »
She has very few global hit, but many songs that were hits on different continents.
Her only global hits are the Titanic song, All by Myself, Its coming back to me now and Because you loved me.
the power of love/tell him/Im ur angel/Beauty and the beast/That’s the way it is/Im alive
The power of love wasn’t a hit in Europe for her. It peaked at 25. The original one was a big hit instead.
She had many global hits. She is an adult contemporary singer and her fans tends to purchase albums rather than singles. Which is why her singles charts were somewhat poor. The Power of Love was a big hit and that song was the reason why the album sold like hot cakes in Europe. Somebody like Backstreet Boys or Britney Spears might have far better singles chart runs in Europe compared to her, doesnt mean they are in anyway “much” bigger than her in that region. Honestly you cant sell that many albums globally without having multiple hit singles. Whose gonna… Read more »
Acts such as Led Zeppelin, Metallica, AC/DC, Pink Floyd etc, clearly prove that hit singles, let alone multiple hit singles, are not a prerequisite for huge album sales.
“The Power of Love was a big hit and that song was the reason why the album sold like hot cakes in Europe.”
Think Twice was a much bigger hit than The Power Of Love in Europe, especially in the UK.
I’m not sure what “global hit” means but songs like That’s The Way It Is or I’m Your Angel were major hits in the US and in Europe so they probably qualify as “global hits”…
Again strong single chart runs doesnt mean it is stronger than the other ones. To me Think Twice did well chart wise because people dont really know who Celine Dion was at that time. They were hesitant to buy her album therefore they purchase her single instead of her album. Her album Unison hardly sold a thing at that time. So clearly people purchase her single instead of album. By the time The Power of Love was released, she already had a couple of moderate hits such as Beauty & The Beast, Where Does My Heart Beats Now and off… Read more »
Sorry but I’ve no idea what you’re talking about… You seem to think that The Power Of Love was released after Think Twice ? Actually it was released in january 94 and Think Twice in october 94, i.e. when the album started selling significantly.
Oh didnt noticed your reply. Hmm yeah, I thought Think Twice was released first. That seems a bit weird. Maybe the single was indeed much bigger than The Power of Love after all in Europe
I think it’s time we get Celines page updated already. EUS should be higher and Courage sales as well.
Is there something up with Celine’s page on youtube charts? It’s saying in the past 28 days, My Heart will Go On is her number one video with 26.6 million views. But when you click on the link, the video only has 2.2 million views.
https://charts.youtube.com/artist/%2Fm%2F01cwhp
MJD, it’s been 4 years since this page was updated. Can we get a Céline Dion page updated some time soon? 😊
MJD i have a small question: the youtube streaming numbers for a particular song are only from the youtube link found on that artist’s vevo account or does it add all the songs (or as many as possible) on youtube for this song (coming from multiple fan accounts for example)
“Given respective markets, 4,21 million in France equals to some 34 million units in the US, more than what Michael Jackson‘s Thriller did.” Hmmm… France’s population is about 1/5 of the US population, so 4 million in France would be more like 20 million in the US. And if by “markets” you’re referring to total album sales in the US vs. France, well that just means music is more popular in the US than in France. As for Celine, I wonder where she would rank in the list of most successful artists ever in France ? Johnny Hallyday is clearly… Read more »
Not as simple as 1/5. You need to consider purchasing power as well. For example in 2002 the US market sold 800 million CD but the French sold 130 million CD. So that is more than 6 times not 5 times. And need to also consider that maybe the French market was even smaller proportionately compared to the US back when Deux was released.
“Purchasing power” ? Do you think the UK has more “purchasing power” than France because they have a bigger music market ?
In terms of the music industry. Yes they have bigger purchasing power. Thats what the data says. Not me. 🙄🙄🙄
They have “bigger purchasing power in terms of the music industry” ? What ? I honestly have no idea what you’re saying…
Definition of purchasing power :
1 : the amount of money that a person or group has available to spend
Inflation decreases consumer purchasing power.
2 : the value of money thought of as how much it can buy
a decline in the purchasing power of the dollar
Maybe what he meant is that people in the bigger music markets tend to buy more music compared to others
What is it that u dont get? I already said that Americans purchase more albums than the French per person and that your argument that simply dividing the populations should represents that Deux is not as big as Thriller is in the US are false. Americans have bigger music consumption then the French per person when it comes to music consumption, a.k.a bigger purchasing power when it comes to the music industry. So your claim that because American population is only 5 times bigger than the French we should simply multiply Deux sales by 5 to have an equivalence to… Read more »
OK, let me try to understand… You’re saying that “Americans purchase more albums than the French per person”, and for some reason you’re calling this “purchasing power”.
So here’s a simple question : why do you think Americans purchase more albums than the French ? Just to remind you, the original post was saying it’s because “music is more popular in the US than in France”.
Well it is true. According to GDP Purchasing Power Parity Americans have bigger spending power. Its like saying, an xx race have bigger spending/purchasing/buying power than yy race. What is so wrong with that statement? And since u said Americans are more into music, it means Americans have bigger spending power over music consumption. So whats the big deal? I dont get it. I cant believe u r dragging some ridiculous stuff and try to twist my words. Over something as silly as this. You already got my point. No need to long prolong this conersation.
I’m sorry but you’re not making any sense… As I said above, the UK has (and always had) a bigger music market than France and their GDP is the same. How do you explain that ?
Thats why I said the British have bigger spending power when it comes to music consumption despite their similar GDP. And its not as simple as, to quote u
“France’s population is about 1/5 of the US population, so 4 million in France would be more like 20 million in the US. ”
The only person that doesnt make sense here is you. You know your original statement was wrong and you purposely try to twist my word just because u want to have the last word.
“Thats why I said the British have bigger spending power when it comes to music consumption despite their similar GDP.” What ?? You never mentioned the British or their similar GDP 😆 OK I think I’m done here, let’s just end this boring and frustrating discussion… By the way, you don’t understand what “GDP per capita” and “Purchasing Power Parity” mean, they have nothing to do with the purchasing power of individuals, they’re just tools to compare national economies. I mean, surely you don’t believe that the average Chinese person has eight times more purchasing power than the average French… Read more »