Taylor Swift is the absolute champion of Australia’s charts this week as Folklore (Republic/Universal) bows at No. 1 on the national albums survey and its lead track “Cardigan” rules the singles tally.
“Cardigan” opens at the summit of the ARIA Singles Chart, giving Swift her sixth leader and her first since “Look What You Made Me Do” hit the top in September 2017.
Swift trails only Rihanna (7), Delta Goodrem (9), P!nk (9), Kylie Minogue (10) and Madonna (10) in the list of female solo artists with the most chart toppers, according to ARIA, and she’s the only artist among them to land five No. 1s the last decade.
Folklore opens the floodgates on the singles chart, as all 16 tracks from it debut inside the Top 50, a new record.
Swift shatters the mark for most debuts in one week, previously held jointly by Ed Sheeran and Post Malone at 13. Posty and Michael Jackson jointly own the record for most tracks in the Top 50 in one week, with 17.
Swift’s singles tally includes five in the Top 10. The last artist to have five or more tracks in the top tier was Billie Eilish, who had six Top 10s in April 2019, ARIA reports.
All major commercial radio networks including NOVA, HIT, KIIS and Triple J have played singles from Folklore since its surprise release on July 24.
The records don’t stop there. With Folklore becoming Swift’s sixth chart-topper, the pop star has the most No. 1 albums in Australia by any artist between 2010 and 2020.
Coming in at No. 2 on the current ARIA Albums Chart is Cub Sport’s Like Nirvana (Cub Sport Records/Believe), the Brisbane pop outfit’s fourth album. It’s Cub Sport first appearance in the ARIA Top Ten.
Teenage Aussie rapper The Kid Laroi sees his debut album F*ck Love (Columbia/Sony) start at No. 3. The LP, which features a collaboration with the late Juice WRLD, opens at No. 12 in the U.K.
Finally, veteran Irish singer Ronan Keating snares his eighth Top Ten as Twenty Twenty (Decca/Universal) starts at No. 9, while Aussie country artist Jasmine Rae scores a new career chart peak with Lion Side (ABC/Universal), her fifth album. It’s new at No. 11.