Mumford & Sons Soars Atop Elite 100

Joseph Longo / Invision / AP – Mumford & Sons
Marcus Mumford of Mumford & Sons puts his all into it at the inaugural Arroyo Seco Music Festival at Brookside Golf Course in Pasadena, Calif., June 25.

In another breath of fresh air, three artists have scaled the heights of the Elite 100 Artists chart, once again relegating the perennial chart champ Drake to the No. 4 slot.

The leader for the week ending Nov. 22 is Mumford & Sons, flying high after the Nov. 16 release of its new album, Delta. The band logged an impressive 234,600 album sales, miles ahead of every other artist in that category. The group also sold 17,400 songs and recorded a respectable 28.4 million streams, but the high number of album purchases, the most heavily weighted category on the chart, earned Marcus Mumford & Co. 255,200 album units, nearly doubling the next artist in that category.

Mumford & Sons has tons of tour plans for 2019, with a full run through North America already on sale. The band’s next performance is scheduled to be Nov. 29 at The O2 – London.

The group’s crossover success in the rock world has demonstrated the growing appeal of Americana-inspired music in the U.S. and overseas. Mumford & Sons grossed $4.9 million in 2017, with an average ticket price hovering around $44. The band had a great run in Florida, Sept. 19-21, filling Miami’s AmericanAirlines Arena; Tampa’s Amalie Arena; and Orlando’s Amway Center, moving more than 10,500 tickets and grossing more than $575,000 in each market.

The newcomer at No. 2 was Michael Bublé, who proved he can still sell records with the release of his latest album, love. The crooner logged 102,200 album sales for the week, second only to Mumford & Sons in that category. He sold and streamed more songs than the chart leader, with 30,700 and 38.5 million respectively, but the large gap in album sales put him with 130,900 album units for the week.

Michael Bublé tours North America and Europe throughout 2019, with dates already booked into November. A special run of dates is currently planned in Canada in August, with Toronto, London, and Ottawa all routed in Ontario, two nights planned for Bell Centre in Montreal and a closer at Centre Videotron in Quebec City, Quebec.

Queen still occupies the No. 3 slot thanks to the success of the Freddie Mercury biopic “Bohemian Rhapsody.” The group led the chart in song sales, with 120,100 on the week. The rest of the band still tours as Queen + Adam Lambert and has been holding court at Park Theater at Park MGM Las Vegas.

Drake was the weekly leader in streams, with 119.1 million. He maintains his radio ubiquity, thanks to his feature on the Travis Scott single “SICKO MODE.”

Mariah Carey also dropped a project, Caution, on Nov. 16, and sold 44,700 albums and logged 32.6 million streams, good enough to get her to No. 5.

Thanks to a “scheduling conflict” the singer had to cancel a bunch of October dates in Australia and New Zealand this after initially postponing them from February. There is no word when she will next head down under, though she is scheduled to hold down a Vegas residency at The Colosseum At Caesars Palace and a run in North America.

Other artists still soaring on new releases include: Imagine Dragons (No. 10), whose Origins came out Nov. 9; Mark Knopfler (No. 23), whose Down The Road Wherever came out Nov. 16; Anderson .Paak (No. 24), who dropped Oxnard Nov. 16; Kane Brown (No. 37), who released Experiment Nov. 9; and Casting Crowns (No. 52), whose Only Jesus came out Nov. 16.

Next week’s charts will include projects from Rita Ora, The Diplomats, Boosie Badazz, and Ed Harcourt.

Also, be on the lookout for new music this week from Alessia Cara, The 1975, Earl Sweatshirt, Jeff Tweedy, Daniel Romano, Bryan Ferry, and Meek Mill.