France Album Sales: Madonna

Madonna Drawing

When you check some charts from 30 years ago, you don’t expect to see many relevant artists in 2016 on it. In May, 17, 1986, the greatest era of Madonna’s career started as True Blue’s lead single Live To Tell debuted on the French Singles chart. If she was already a big selling pop star before that, this album has put her on the throne, a throne she has yet to leave since.

Her Top 10 hits are countless, so are her #1 albums and her Gold certifications. Great chart histories are positive but do not always reveal huge sales. So, where does Madonna stand among France’s best selling artists hierarchy and how much has her catalog sold as of now? It is time to review the impressive discography of the American superstar. Please be aware all Spotify figures refer to worldwide streaming as they only aim to display which albums still have strong catalog hits right now. Let’s go!

4.5 2 votes
Article Rating
Subscribe
Notify of
guest

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

22 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Marcelo

Hi.
Very nice wok.

You have information about japan charts.

I remenber good positions osaka hot 100, tokio hot 100.

But never found about oricon internationally chart.

Do you have?

Michael

I would love to read it. 😊

Anna

I completely agree about Hard Candy. It was the turning point (or maybe even of no return), not American Life. From the cover with her fingers touching her left cheek and box – it was creepy.

Anna

The greatest mystery for me is Immaculate Collection in Billboard 200. It entered the chart a month after ther release and peaked at #2 three months after the release. Why?

Anna

Thank you. Is it the only Diamond US album that weren’t #1 on Billboard 200? Funny it was at at first behind Vanilla Ice and then behind Mariah Carey.
http://www.billboard.com/music/madonna/chart-history/billboard-200/song/3745

Fix

I was just wondering. How does “Ray of Light” managed to be so successful in Europe when you consider most of her singles did terribly on the European charts. It seems like this album does not reflect the conventional belief that strong singles = strong album sales. It is the case in America though, as the album only managed to sell 4-5 million, which isnt really that big for Madonna standard. I hope you could explain to me how it ended being such a strong seller. Thank you in advance.

Robby

Hello MJD!

Do Janet Jackson’s too please 🙂

All the best

Robby

FM

Angel was no single in France, only in a few markets like the USA. In France we did have Crazy for you during the summer which has been one of her least successful album.
Into the Groove was huge and managed to get into the French top 10 as soon as it was released, a very rare achievement at that time.

Gustavo

Hi MJD, do you have an official page in facebook? It would be easier to follow you there. Thanks!

FM

Actually there were no additional single for Hard Candy in France, after summer, until the release in December of Miles Away, without a video. About 6 months separated the 2 singles and that killed off the album which had managed to remain within the TOP 100 all along the first singles career runs.

Nick

What a great job! Thank you for this! Madonna for me is a unique album seller. I am happy that after 30+ years her NEW album “Rebel Heart” managed to sell 55.000 in France and 1.000.000 worldwide… I mean that 1 million for 2016 is a great number! Also I should add that Rebel Heart sold 1million WORLDWIDE and the sales are spread WORLDWIDE. For example Celine’s latest album might have sold 1 million but the 800k are from France and Canada. (I am exaggerating a little bit but I want you to understand my point of view). I am… Read more »

kieron sargent

i dont think flop is the right word. u cant compare sales of ray of light to mdna or sales of true blue to rebel heart. the industry is different albums dont sell like they used to. sure some of her albums have underperformed a bit but all have made the best seller list world wide for the year they were released . great article though

Sami

Spotify figures don’t include all the streams. You have left out almost all Immaculate Collection- and Celebration-collection albums’ streams. For example Papa Don’t Preach’s total streams are 11,63 M ( True Blue-album: 4,02 M, Immaculate Collection-album:0,87 M, Celebration-album 6,74 M) or Like A Prayer’s total streams are 45,25 M (Like A Prayer-album: 15,93 M, Immaculate Collection-album: 0,93 M and Celebration- album 28,39 M). And so on and so on.
Sami