People Still Buy Music: Almost a million Timber-fans bought The 20/20 Experience

Almost a million people bought copies of The 20/20 Experience this past week, an album that Justin Timberlake recorded in just 20 days. It sold 968,000 copies in its first week out according to Nielsen Soundscan, making it the biggest-selling record of the year so far. These numbers should provide the humble Timberlake with that boost of confidence he so desperately needs.

This week was also Timberlake’s best-ever for sales as a solo artist. His previous high point was moving 684,000 copies of FutureSex/Love Sounds its first week out.

Billboard notes that, in 2012, there were only 11 records that sold more copies over the course of the whole year than 20/20 sold in just one week. Maroon 5’s Overexposed, for example, sold 988,000 copies in 2012, and Adele’s 21 sold 4.4 million.

20/20 also sold a shit-ton of copies online: 452,000 copies of the record were downloaded digitally, making it the third-largest week ever for an album on the web. Only Taylor Swift’s Red and Lady Gaga’s Born This Way sold more, and the latter was priced at just $5 on sites like Amazon.

Timberlake also demolished the rest of the chart. The No. 2 record, Kacey Musgraves’ Same Trailer Different Park, moved only 43,000 copies last week.