J. Cole finally unleashed his sixth studio album The Off-Season to his eager fans on Friday (May 14) and unsurprisingly, the project is on track to debut at No. 1 on the Billboard 200. It would mark Cole’s sixth consecutive chart topper behind 2018’s KOD.
On Saturday afternoon (May 15), Chart Data fired off a tweet that read, “.@JColeNC‘s ‘The Off-Season’ aiming for #1 debut on US albums chart with 280-310K units. J. Cole’s sixth #1 in a row and challenging for biggest debut of the year.”
The following morning (May 16), Chart Data also reported The Off-Season is 2021’s largest streaming debut on Spotify, tweeting, “.@JColeNC’s ‘The Off-Season’ earns the biggest streaming debut for any album on Spotify this year with 59 million streams.”
Comprised of only 12 songs and no physical product, The Off-Season (Dreamville/Roc Nation/Interscope) will make a run for the overall biggest first week in the first five months of 2021.
The current No. 1 is Taylor Swift’s Fearless (Taylor’s Version) with roughly 291,000 total album-equivalent units. Meanwhile, Nicki Minaj’s updated 2009 Beam Me Up Scotty mixtape is projected to move around 65,000 to 75,000 total album-equivalent units in its opening week.
With Cole’s projected 280,000 to 310,000 total album-equivalent units, he could potentially slide by Swift next week.
J. Cole Cops To Infamous Diddy Fight On 'The Off-Season' Track 'let.go.my.hand'
As soon as The Off-Season dropped, so many fans rushed to Spotify to stream the project the site briefly crashed. Prior to its release, Cole shared the tracklist to his Instagram account, which didn’t indicate any guest features. But it turned out there were a several, including Dipset legend Cam’ron on the opening track “95.south,” Morray and 21 Savage on “my life” and Lil Baby on “pride.is.the.devil.”
The album is ok, I still don’t understand why everyone is trying to overhype this as the holy grail.
So I’m not the only one that just Doesn’t Hear It? I like Cole and praise his success and the way he was able to adapt to the times. I just don’t hear the all time greatness people are claiming. I mean people are saying this is great as the classics. MMLP, Illmatic, 2001, Blueprint, Food & Liquor, GKMC, TPAB, College Dropout, how?
It’s just lames and hypebeasts labeling this a classic right as it comes out. Real listeners know better. And for the record, this Cole album is really nothing special.
I had to transform into rainydayz mode in order to like the album and I did. Can’t imagine enjoying it on a sunny afternoon though. But that’s when Dreamville compilation comes in handy, so it is what it is and it is all good. Contrats to J.Cole for taking that number one
It wasn’t his best body of work but I’m bumping it. I want Cole to do well he is definitely 1 of my favorites.
This doesn’t count for shit though as he relied on guests to prop up his album. His last few albums he was able to do that shit without the help of anyone
you make no sense. we didn’t even know he had guest until we heard it. he kept the features on the low
He was hyping 21 savage hard in the documentary.
And album sales have showed only 150k at best for first week until he added in a verse from baby.
Slightly disappointed in the album overall. Maybe because the first track is way better than everything else, it feels like the rest of the project is wasted potential. But he will sell and good on him for doing so. I just feel like this is a slight improvement on the weak kod and terrible album before. Very little replay value (like most of today’s music), it will get crazy plays for the next few weeks and then nobody will ever listen to it again once the next big artist drops something.
I just love J Cole New Album He out did himself He never disappointed in His music He Sounds So Much better Than These Mumbled Rappers They All Rapping about the same thing At least J Cole he is keeping Real
I always felt Cole was one step behind kdot but way ahead of Drake as far as rapping. Cole never had that huge single but his rhymes are top 5 of current rappers
J Cole You Are my favorite Rapper Keep your head up You Are Reaching for your Dreams don’t let anyone tell you differently