Hits
The success of ‘The Art of Loving’ remains unchanged more than half a year after its release. Olivia Dean’s second album continues in the British top 3 and – what has more merit – in the American top 10. Like Adele and Amy Winehouse before her, she has managed to succeed on the other side of the Atlantic. Mediatraffic estimates that it has just surpassed 3 million copies globally, which is quite comparable.
Olivia Dean’s second album has been double platinum in the United Kingdom (600,000 copies), gold in the United States (500,000) and has certifications in countries as diverse as Australia, Canada, France, Norway (double platinum), New Zealand (quadruple platinum), Sweden and Portugal. That is to say, it is one of the clearest global successes of recent years.
Even in countries as unfriendly to Anglo pop as Spain, the public has reacted. ‘The Art of Living’ has been in the top 20 here and spends its 34th week on the list at number 49, completely stabilized. We deduce that it will soon be a Gold Record in Spain, just as the two main singles from the album have achieved, ‘Man I Need’ and ‘So Easy (To Fall in Love)’.
Flops
Also in September 2025, another album destined to conquer the charts was published, ‘Play’ by Ed Sheeran. However, this was not a million-dollar project like other Edward Christopher releases. ‘Play’ only has three certifications: gold in the United Kingdom (100,000 copies), gold in France (50,000) and gold in New Zealand (50,000). When it left Mediatraffic’s world top 20, it barely exceeded 250,000 copies globally.
The strangest thing is that with 450 million streams on Spotify, the single ‘Azizam’ cannot exactly be considered a failure. Not the 365 million from ‘Sapphire’, either. However, it is clear that Ed Sheeran has not managed to transfer that enthusiasm to the rest of the album. With the exception of ‘Old Phone’, ‘Camera’ and ‘A Little More’, the streams of the full-length tracks are very low and the actual sales of ‘Play’ do not reach one million copies.
If Ed Sheeran’s albums used to last years on the UK charts, this ‘Play’ only lasted 19 weeks in what is his strategic territory par excellence. If we go to the United States, the album entered a timid position 5, a figure for which any female artist would be crucified, and no one realized that 5 weeks later, ‘Play’ had disappeared from the entire Billboard 200. The one she had retained and the old ‘Shape of You’ and ‘Perfect’ are still on global charts years later, but what is her new material is generating many doubts.
