Cordae is not a household name. He's never had a smash single, or even been featured on a chart topping single by a bigger artist. He is, however, one of the most respected rappers in his age range. Cordae has dropped two critically acclaimed albums in the last five years. He's also earned props from superstars like Lil Wayne and ASAP Rocky. Cordae's third album, The Crossroads, is set for release on November 15, but he is not concerned in the slightest about the first week sales.
Cordae made this point crystal clear through a series of tweets on November 12. The rapper believed that first week sales were an overrated metric, and fail to accurately gauge whether an album is a real success. "Want to say this now I don’t give 1 f*ck about a first week sale," the rapper wrote. "It’s a very inaccurate way to calculate impact, especially with the current streaming metrics." Cordae went on to cite examples of first week sales being misleading metrics for an artist's carer. "I seen somebody do 11K first week and then do a ARENA TOUR off the same album," he claimed. "That’s the end of my Ted talk."
Cordae Believes First Week Sales Are A Bad Metric
Cordae's sentiment was met with support by fans. Many commended the rapper for placing emphasis on quality, and the long term success of an album versus its first week of availability. There were some other fans, though, who felt that Cordae was using this approach to get out in front of potentially low numbers for The Crossroads. He had a response ready. "N**gas said my last project first week numbers wasn’t good," he recalled. "And I ended up doing a sold out headline world tour." He also detailed the ways in which music consumption has changed since he was a kid.
"In the 90/2000s music was consumed by people actually going to the stores and buying albums," the rapper posited. "When you did 100K first week that meant 100 thousand people went and bought the CD." He went on to note that streaming equivalent sales do not translate the same way. "Now you can have 300,000 people listening to your album on streaming," he concluded. "Equivalent is 200." Cordae likes where his career is at, and his fans seem to feel the same.