by According to reports on July 16th, NCT’s Jungwoo and Stray Kids’ Lee Know will be presenters of the music program ‘Music Core.’ However, the show’s producers officially declared: “Nothing has been confirmed.”
The last episode is scheduled for July 17th, and after that, the show will have a 3-week hiatus due to the ‘Tokyo Olympics.’ Jungwoo and Lee Know are expected to take the MC places after the ‘Tokyo Olympics.’
BTS and NCT are the K-Pop idols with the most album sales in the US
BTS and NCT had the highest number of album sales in the United States in the first half of 2021 among K-pop artists. On July 13th, MRC Data released the ranking of singers based on sales (albums and digital songs) in the US market from January 1st to July 1st. MRC Data provides the data and analytics for the music industry and consumers, including Billboard, music retailers, and digital service providers.
Based on the report, BTS’s “BE” is the only K-pop release included in the Top 10 Albums list in the United States – it came in at #6. According to MRC Data, “BE” has recorded album sales of 128,000 copies in the United States in the past six months.
After its release in November 2020, “BE” reached 500,000 units in the US in just its second week. In South Korea, “BE” is the fastest K-pop album globally, selling over a million copies on Hanteo Chart. The mark was reached in just over 30 minutes of launch.
When it comes to the best-selling physical albums in the United States in the first half of 2021, the work of BTS and NCT made the top 10 list – BTS occupied two positions, while NCT had one entry.
According to MRC Data, BTS’ “BE” was ranked 6th, with album sales of 125,000 units in the United States. Position 10 is the “MAP OF THE SOUL: 7” of the BTS with 105,000 units. In 2020, “MAP OF THE SOUL: 7” is the best-selling physical album in the United States. In February alone, a total of 646,000 copies were sold in the country.
Meanwhile, “BE” came in fifth on the list of best-selling physical albums, with 252,000 units. Another K-pop release with the highest number of album sales in the United States in the first half of 2021 is NCT’s “RESONANCE Pt. 1”. He is in 8th position with 106,000 copies.
“RESONANCE Pt. 1”, released in October 2020, is the first album that made NCT one million sales. The album debuted at No. 6 on the Billboard 200 and charted for nine weeks. He also topped the United World Chart in October 2020 with 764,000 sales equivalent.
K-pop: NCT Dream beats BTS and is 2021’s most influential artist
On July 1st, the Hanteo Chart revealed the most influential K-pop stars of the year (to date). Led by EXO’s NCT Dream, BTS and Baekhyun, the ranking shows artists who have significantly impacted the industry during the first half of 2021.
The criteria for ranking artists are their album sales (cumulative sales, first-week sales, real-time data), music (picture performance, platform performance, among other data), media and broadcast (such as music video, radio/TV), social networks (followers on platforms, activity, mentions, among other data), web search (such as number of searches, number of comments) and global fandom (user authentication data, Whosfan activity, among others Dice).
The ranking gathers data from January 1st to June 20th. The information was collected by the Whosfan Big Data Lab, which acts as a genuine information analysis laboratory for Hanteo.
First on the list of most influential artists during the first half of 2021 is NCT Dream. The boy group was the first to hit the one million mark on the Hanteo Chart. In the first week of sales, “Hot Sauce” sold 1,010,766 copies, but the record kept good deals even after the first seven days, accumulating 1,956,558 in the first half of 2021.
The second is BTS. Although the group did not release a physical album during the first half of this year, they recorded total sales of 1,155,970 copies with one of their previous albums.
EXO star Baekhyun won third place on Hanteo Chart’s Most Influential Artists list. It is worth remembering that the male soloist broke the sales record in the first week for a solo artist with “Bambi.” The project reached 868,840 copies, surpassing the record of 600,908 set by its previous album, “Delight.”
In addition, it is worth noting that the Top 10 is made up of six male and four female artists. Three solo artists are among the top 10.
Check out the Top 10:
- NCT Dream
- BTS
- Baekhyun, do EXO
- EXO
- SEVENTEEN
- IU
- Rosé, do BLACKPINK
- TXT
- BLACKPINK
- TWICE
