Is Megan Thee Stallion's "Traumazine" Only A "Flop" In Urban Media?
Updated: May 12
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The numbers are in, and Megan Thee Stallion's sophomore album "Traumazine" will debut at #3 on Hits Daily Double with 66K sales (10K pure). , while Billboard doing their alternative mathing has Megan at #4 with 63K.
Ok, now, get it all out of your systems...FLOP, FLOPITY-FLOP, FLOPIANA, FLOPICILOUS...FLOP, FLOP, FLOP, FLOP.
That will be 99.9% of the headlines in the Chitlin Circuit cause only in the urban market do albums live and
die within the first week of their release. So, Megan will join the long list of artists like Kendrick Lamar, Drake, Lizzo, Jack Harlow, Roddy Ricch, Fivio Foreign, Post Malone, Chris Brown, and many more who failed to live up to predictions or do better than their previous projects.
And while the laziest hot takes, but probably the most popular, will be that "Traumazine" did not sell because it was "trash," the album reviews, and my ears, tell a different story. The critics rewarded Megan for being more vulnerable and experimenting with her sounds while still being that hard-hitting lyrical Houston rapper. Not only that, Megan was able to please the harshest critics of them all - "Day 1 Hotties."
So, what went wrong?
THEE 40K SALES MISTAKE
Let's first get this out of the way. I understand leaks affected Megan Thee Stallion's rollout and forced her to drop "Traumazine" as a "surprise" project. Obviously, in a music market where the rap aesthetic is way
more popular than the actual music, Megan dropping an album out of the blue was not ideal, especially at this stage of her career where she is a rap star but not yet a superstar.
I will deal with that milk-dud head-ass nigga next week.
However, that is not what cost Megan 40K + sales in the first week. Instead, Megan and Kevin Liles/300 Entertainment cost themselves those sales the minute they chose "Plan B" and "Pressurelicious" as the follow-up singles to the successful "Sweetest Pie."
The whole point of singles is to build up anticipation by giving fans a preview of what to expect from an album. It's similar to movie trailers; you cut out all the fluff and give people the action or crying scenes. So similar to singles, they should not only serve as a lead-up to the projects but invoke excitement, curiosity, intrigue, drama, or any type of intense emotion that will compel more than your core audience (and haters) to immediately check out the album.
"Plan B" and "Pressurelicious" were momentum stoppers because they failed to invoke the proper reaction the album needed before its release.
"Plan B" is an unapologetic rap song with a nostalgic feel in the best way possible. However, with rap
music losing its appeal and Pop / Pop Rap making a comeback, this song needed to be pushed and packaged in a certain way. Instead, it was tossed out to the public without a proper rollout and then given a music video that was used as a vehicle to promote a designer, not the song. "Plan B" cost Megan her first 20K in sales.
Next, there is "Pressurelicious." Do I even have to say anything? I wrote a dissertation on why this song should have never been a single; in fact, it should have never made the album. This is the only song on "Traumazine" I skip. That's where the other 20K of sales went because this song invoked the emotion of "doubt," "apprehension," "confusion," and "fear" as to what the hell "Traumazine" would be.
When you drop an album this close to Beyonce's "Renaissance," you cannot give people any reason to wait to listen to your project. Instead, you need to provide GP with multiple reasons to pause Bey to give your shit a chance.
The lack of a proper rollout/video for "Plan B" and "Pressurelicious" just being all wrong was a mistake that cost Megan at least 40K in first-week sales.