They say no publicity is bad publicity…
While I’m not sure Morgan Wallen would agree with that right now, the backlash he’s received over the n-word video isn’t doing anything to hurt him on the iTunes charts. Believe it or not…
Since the video surfaced on Tuesday of Morgan using the racial slur outside his home, he’s already been suspended by his record label, dropped from this year’s ACM Awards and had his music pulled from most radio stations across the country, as well as playlists on Apple Music and Spotify.
But if you take a look at the iTunes charts, Morgan is still dominating.
As of today, Morgan currently has the top three albums on the chart. His latest album, Dangerous: The Double Album, is actually on there twice – the explicit version at #1 and the clean version at #3. Sandwiched between those is his debut album, If I Know Me, which was released in 2018. And you even have his Stand Alone EP charting at #5 as well.
And things are pretty much the same over on the songs chart.
As of the time I’m writing this, Morgan currently has the top song on iTunes with his (current?) single, “More Than My Hometown,” along with four of the top 5 songs and 7 songs total in the top 10.
And remember, this is all-genre, not just the country charts.
So what’s going on?
Is this a case of the Streisand effect, where the more you try to hide something or make it go away the more attention it gets? Or are these people who saw Morgan’s name in the news (for an obviously terrible reason) and got curious about his music? Are his fans thinking his music might get pulled all together? Or are they just committed to supporting him no matter what?
Honestly it’s probably a little bit of all of the above. But either way it’s clear that if you thought the demand for Morgan’s music was going to go away in light of his most recent (but definitely not his first) controversy – it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen.
