Cake’s Showroom Of Compassion, the band’s first new album in seven years, has debuted on the Billboard charts at No. 1—which is certainly a commendable achievement for Cake. Unfortunately it’s also yet another sign that the music industry is in steep decline, considering it managed to pull off that feat with only 44,000 copies sold, a new record low for a chart-topping album. (It takes that questionable honor from Taylor Swift, who moved only 52,000 copies of Speak Now last week for the lowest-selling No. 1 album since SoundScan began keeping these figures in 1991.) The New York Times puts that number in perspective, pointing out that just over a decade ago, N’Sync’s record-setting No Strings Attached had the industry’s biggest-ever opening by selling approximately 2 million albums more than Showroom. Still, it was No Strings Attached, dudes, come on! Anyway, bittersweet congratulations to Cake.
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