CSPC: Justin Timberlake Popularity Analysis
It was supposed to be his time. Over a period of two months Justin Timberlake starred in Woody Allen‘s latest film, released his fifth solo album Man of the Woods plus two singles, and performed at the Superbowl. Too good to be true.
Theaters-wise, Wonder Wheel has been a disaster, the worst results of the director since his title September released 30 years ago. It becomes only more worrying when we know that Allen issues one movie per year on average.
Feedback from his Superbowl performance were chaotic too. His tribute to Prince was seen as fairly insulting considering the opinions of the late singer who clearly stated he hated those post-mortem duets. The audience was also disappointing, the lowest in 9 years.
He is left with his new album. The lead single Filthy debuted at #9 thanks to downloads by his fanbase but it dropped out of the Top 50 after sitting there for only 3 weeks. Abroad it missed the Top 10 almost everywhere including in the UK, Germany and France. Say Something, a duet with Chris Stapleton, was rushed to take over the promotion of the album. While the song debuted at #9 inside the Hot 100, we still have to wait and see how it holds during the upcoming months.
If the start of year is less promising than first hoped, the career of Timberlake has been impressive. With only five albums, spread over 4 eras, he piled up plenty of hits including Cry Me A River, Rock Your Body, SexyBack, My Love, What Comes Around… Goes Around, Summer Love, Suit & Tie, Mirrors and Can’t Stop the Feeling!. He also contributed to hits like Where Is The Love?, Signs, Give It to Me, Ayo Technology, 4 Minutes, Dead and Gone, Holy Grail and Love Never Felt So Good. Is that enough to top the total of his former boys band, NSYNC? The group is on 44 million equivalent album sales in total. Another target for Timberlake is to beat his main challengers for the Prince of Pop crown. So far, studies resulted in Ed Sheeran‘s last update totalling 45,5 million, Justin Bieber‘s tally of 47 million and Bruno Mars‘ figure of 47,7 million. Among male acts from the last 25 years, Drake is close to 57 million, Usher is on 59,5 million, Michael Bublé on 62,1 million and, of course, Eminem is way ahead at more than 155 million.
As usual, I’ll be using the Commensurate Sales to Popularity Concept in order to relevantly gauge his results. This concept will not only bring you sales information for all Timberlake‘s albums, physical and download singles, as well as audio and video streaming, but it will also determine their true popularity. If you are not yet familiar with the CSPC method, the next page explains it with a short video. I fully recommend watching the video before getting into the sales figures. Of course, if you are a regular visitor feel free to skip the video and get into the figures.
like too see if robbie williams/take that can beat him………..especially since he has no sales in the u.s.a.
90 million is incredible………………….i don’t know why anyone would be upset with those totals.
Hi Nathan! His cumulative tally is obviously good! The disappointment is more about status vs real sales. I posted Avril Lavigne right now: they both debuted in 2002, they both issued 5 albums (although JT’s fifth is still new) and Avril has much less collaborations. I’m quite sure 95% of people would expect JT to be much higher, they are almost tied (46m vs 43m) with the gap and more being entirely due to featurings. There is a gap between the general public’s perception and the reality. He is one of the biggest from the last 15 years, but one… Read more »
MJD, care to hint us at who’s next? 🙂
I’m very curious about Aerosmith, AC/DC and Elvis.
Hi Dan!
Avril Lavigne is the next one (coming very soon!) since no female has been posted since November, then AC/DC will follow 😉
Awesome, thanks!
He is the same as his group, started successful but never really big outside us
1.Bomt (31 M) > Control (15M) > Justified (11 M)
2.Oidia (23 M) >Janet (19M) > Future sex (15M)
3.Britney (12.9 M) >The Velvet rope (10 M) > The 20 experience (6.7 M)
4.Itz (11 M) >All for you (10 M) >The 20 experience 2 (2.7M)
5.Blackout (4 M) >Damita Jo (1.7 M)> Man of the Moon (1.5 M with luck).
Plus: Circus (6.9 M). Femme Fatale (4.2 M).
Without feats : Britney (98 M) > Janet (74 M) > Justin (36 M).
Bomt (23.8 M). Justin Timberlake pure albums sales (23.4 M).
Hi Lavigner! While I agree that JT is someway weaker than what he is supposed to be, this comparison isn’t really fair. Britney / Janet / JT started at very different moments and JT already had a career before, so even if it was his 1st/2nd/3rd album, he was as fresh as Britney was at the same stage of her discography. Britney’s third came in 2001 when she was 19, JT’s third was released in 2013 when he was 32. Also, he is a bit higher than 36m without feats as the biggest of his Orphan tracks, Can’t Stop the… Read more »
He debuted when Britney if you considered nsync, but the limelight was divided by four. He was the most popular of them, but Britney was much more popular than him. Nsync always opened much better than Britney in Usa, but in the zone opened much better than Justified there even though Me against to the music was a flop there. And internationally, Justin did not make himself known until his debut solo. Therefore, until Justified, Justin was not a world star, and even in Usa, he was far of exposure of Britney there. However, I want to make a comparison… Read more »
Hi Lavigner! I’m not comparing Britney with Justin, I’m precisely saying that their careers / periods / pace of release is so much different that it is difficult to get an accurate picture of it. You say that JT only had 3 successful albums, that’s true, but he also released only 3 albums in his first 11 years! Anyway, it is clear that overall Britney is bigger. In the US, there may be a game if you check NSYNC + JT against Britney, but Worldwide she is undoubtedly much bigger than him. That’s why I compared him to Bruno Mars… Read more »
I compared Justin with Janet and Britney because they are, in some way, related. But you’re right to compare him better with Bruno and Justin B. It’s incredible that Justin is perceived as bigger than them. In my opinion, that’s because he always had a good marketing team that exaggerates his success, but this time, for the first time, the media, which have always praised him, are destroying him. I believe that this semi failure with his new album is an example of the influence of the media in the success in a artist sometimes. If they had praised his… Read more »
He is the most overrated artist of the 21st century in my opinion.
If I may ask, why Justin Timberlake’s and NSYNC’s final CSPC numbers are not included in the “CSPC: Top Selling Artists Ever (EAS)” list along with all other artists?
Hi again Daydreamer!
Everything is up to date now 🙂
Thanks! I thought FS/LS would have a higher total, closer to 20M cspc. I remember that album was everywhere back then. But I suppose that was already well into the period of declining album sales.
With the reception Man of the Woods is getting, I can’t imagine it getting past 1.5 M total cspc.
Sold less than Britney AND local Janet ?
Woo JT time to retire but don’t forget to apologize to Britney and Janet before you go 🙂
Imagine being this pressed…
His sales in Spain are incredibly low. I thought they liked teen oriented singers ? I mean, when he started he was fresh out of NSYNC and he never made it in Spain.
NSYNC was not big in Spain either.
46 M is very disappointing for an artist of his statuses, especially when he would have sold only 36 million without the feats. He is not even among the ten best-selling artists of his generation. Obviously, their numbers are not bad but they are far from his statutus.
Status#