It is virtually a certainty that J. Cole’s The Off-Season will be the #1 album in America next week. The only real question is whether the Dreamville Records boss can secure the largest sales week of 2021.
According to HitsDailyDouble, J. Cole’s The Off-Season is projected to open with 280,000-310,000 first-week sales units. He is now on pace to pass Taylor Swift’s re-recorded Fearless album which debuted with 291,000 units in April.
The Off-Season was released on May 14, and the studio LP has dominated the major streaming service ever since. J. Cole’s latest body of work earned the biggest streaming album debut on Spotify in 2021 with 59 million streams.
Songs from The Off-Season occupy most of the Top 10 for Spotify’s daily Top 200 chart and Apple Music’s daily Top 100 chart in the US. Currently, “My Life” featuring 21 Savage and Morray leads both the Spotify and Apple Music rankings.
Industry prognosticators anticipate “My Life” will open at #1 on Billboard‘s Hot 100 which would give J. Cole his first career No. 1 on that chart. Every track on The Off-Season is expected to make it into the Top 40 next week, and four records could launch in the Hot 100’s Top 10 simultaneously.
“Interlude” was the first offering from J. Cole’s new collection. The official YouTube audio for that song has amassed more than 8 million plays since it arrived on the platform on May 7. It trended on YouTube for several days.
Besides 21 Savage and Morray, The Off-Season also includes features by Bas, Lil Baby, and 6LACK. In addition, Cam’ron, Lil Jon, Damian Lillard, and Puff Daddy made appearances on the project as well.
The Off-Season is set to become J. Cole’s sixth #1 album. 2011’s Cole World: The Sideline Story (218,000), 2013’s Born Sinner (297,000), 2014’s 2014 Forest Hills Drive (371,000), 2016’s 4 Your Eyez Only (492,000), and 2018’s KOD (397,000) each broke the 200K mark for first-week units.
Took years to reach this form.
The Off-Season. My new album.
Available now. https://t.co/sgVCaa62hU
— J. Cole (@JColeNC) May 14, 2021