A friend IM’d us the other day asking for our bets on what the new Animal Collective CD would SoundScan. The hype surrounding the release of Merriweather Post Pavilion was palpable — so much in fact, that some wondered if the vinyl release could actually break the Billboard top 200. And Bon Iver had us all swooning the return of heartfelt folk to the list of critical-to-near-mainstream success stories. Yet little hype or hoopla was made about Noble Beast, the newest effort from Andrew Bird, mainly because it shared the same release date as the aforementioned records. But when the increasingly unimportant Nielson SoundScans arrived on our computers this morning, it wasn’t our Merriweather predictions that had us surprised, it was who actually sold more.
First of all, let us continue by saying congratulations to all three of these artists, as having independent musicians from independent labels in the top 15 of the Billboard top 200 is pretty amazing. Especially when you consider that most of the general buying public prefers mainstream establishments like Taylor, Beyonce, Nickelback, Kanye and Twilight (rounding out the top 5 respectively). Not to mention Bon Iver’s Blood Bank was only an EP and if you count Animal Collective’s vinyl sales, it would’ve charted even higher, but we felt like framing this news piece as a glowing review and recommendation for one Andrew Bird. A career over a decade in the making, with stops at Rykodisc and Righteous Babe before his current home on Fat Possum, there are few who would be more deserving to be the current king of indie than he.
