Sorry Sigur Rós. Bad luck Björk. But the first Icelandic act to ever top the ARIA Albums chart is folk rock collective Of Monsters And Men for their debut album My Head Is An Animal.
According to Noise 11, the band have surpassed the previously held #2 by Björk, who debuted at the position with the release of her second album Post in July of 1995.
Despite their record being released last March, and the band visiting the country last June for Splendour In The Grass, it’s taken several months for the record buying public to take full notice, a groundswell no doubt helped by the band’s appearance on tour at the recent Laneway Festival through February, a handful of headlining sideshows, and of course, taking out the penultimate position on the Triple J Hottest 100.
The song in question ‘Little Talks’ fell just behind Macklemore & Ryan Lewis’ ‘Thrift Shop’ as the best song of the year as voted by Triple J voters, coming in at #2, which was also predicted by the two Brisbane IT experts who put together the Warmest 100. Along with ‘Mountain Sound’, ‘Little Talks’ is one of two Top 40 hits from the album thus far, sitting at #39 and #11 respectively in the ARIA Singles Chart.
The impact of the Hottest 100 and Laneway on album sales wasn’t just limited to Of Monsters And Men and Flume…Of Monsters And Men’s #1 chart position also manages to stave off Justin Bieber from chart dominance following Flume managing to keep the pop star’s new Believe Acoustic album from the top spot last week. The 22-year-old beatmaker’s self-titled debut sold a total of 7,019 copies last week, propelling the album from #16 to the top of the chart and beating Justin Bieber’s unplugged album, which sold only 6,411, and now falls to the #6 position.
Of Monsters And Men have leapt from their position at #5 last week, beating out Flume, Bieber, as well as pop acts like Pink, Bruno Mars, and their fellow Hottest 100 contenders, Macklemore & Ryan Lewis.
The impact of the Hottest 100 and Laneway on album sales wasn’t just limited to Of Monsters And Men and Flume, with a number of other acts enjoying bumps in their sales. Hottest 100 and fellow Laneway act Alt-J are currently spending their first weeks inside the ARIA Top 10 with their Mercury prize winning An Awesome Wave, which moves up three places to a new peak position of #9.
Chet Faker’s Thinking In Textures EP also gains a boost, making its first appearance inside the Top 50. Again no doubt boosted by the exposure from Laneway Festival, the Hottest 100, and his cover of Blackstreet’s ‘No Diggity’ featured on a Super Bowl commercial.
Bat For Lashes also makes a chart re-entry with her latest album The Haunted Man appearing at #22 off the back of her own Laneway appearances and two headline shows (over which our Melbourne writer lost his mind a little bit), while fellow Laneway act The Rubens moved down the charts from jumping to #23 last week down to #34.
Of Monsters And Men have now departed the country with their chart-topping achievement in tow, and as our Melbourne reviewer of their show at the Palace wrote, “it’s not often an act like Of Monsters and Men comes to town.” But given their album sales and popularity down under, it may not be too long before they’re back again for another victory lap of the country.
