K-pop group Tomorrow X Together end SZA’s 7-week run at No. 1

NEW YORK – Riding intense fan interest in their collectible CDs, K-pop quintet Tomorrow X Together scored their first No. 1 album on the Billboard chart this week, ending a seven-week run on top for American R&B singer SZA.

The Name Chapter: Temptation, a five-song EP by the South Korean boy band that clocks in under 15 minutes, sold a total of 161,500 equivalent units, including physical sales, downloads and streams, according to the tracking service Luminate.

Nearly all of that sales activity – 98 per cent, Billboard reported – was on that quaint technology known as the CD. The group released 14 editions, including autographed versions and some with mystery bonuses like photo books and postcards.

The No. 1 debut marks the third Top 5 release for Tomorrow X Together – made up of musicians Soobin, Yeonjun, Beomgyu, Taehyun and Hueningkai – after the group landed Minisode 2: Thursday’s Child at No. 4 in 2022 and The Chaos Chapter: Freeze at No. 5 in 2021.

Its pure sales numbers for The Name Chapter: Temptation were the highest on the chart since American singer Taylor Swift’s Midnights in November 2022, Billboard said.

SZA’s SOS, a consistent hit on streaming services, fell to No. 2 for the first time, with another 100,000 units in its eighth week of release. Overall, the album has topped more than one billion streams and one million in equivalent sales.

Swift’s Midnights came in at No. 3 with 68,000 units; American rap producer Metro Boomin’s Heroes & Villains was No. 4 with 47,000; and Canadian rapper Drake and London-born rapper 21 Savage’s joint release, Her Loss, was No. 5 with 44,000.

Further down in the Top 10 were debuts by English singer Sam Smith, whose Gloria hit No. 7 (and took home a Grammy on Sunday for the single Unholy), while American rapper Lil Yachty’s Let’s Start Here, a psychedelic foray that strays from rap music, landed at No. 9. NYTIMES