Unbelonging, the debut album by 19-year old Universal Music Greater China-signed artist Linong Chen, has broken several chart records within Greater China to become the market’s fastest selling debut album of 2020.
Since launching on May 29, Unbelonging has rapidly become China’s most consumed debut album of 2020 to date.
Within its first two weeks on sale, the album has been confirmed to have achieved double diamond certification by QQ Music, with over 500,000 combined albums sold on the platform.
The feat makes Linong Chen the youngest artist in the platform’s history to achieve this.
The album reached diamond status within 1 minute of release, generating more than 4.5 million individual track sales within its first 12 hours on sale.
Unbelonging (格格不入) topped daily, weekly and digital sales charts on QQ, NetEase, Kugou and Kuwo amongst other platforms on release, and sold in excess of 510,000 combined album units during its first week on sale.
Prior to the album’s official launch, an album hashtag, created to announce the album release had accumulated more than 1.2 billion views, with 1.7 million conversations generated on leading Chinese social media platform Weibo.
This continued with 500m mentions on its day of release, across Weibo channels.
Linong has quickly become one of China’s most popular entertainers since he was discovered in 2018, as a contestant on the popular reality TV show ‘Idol Producer’, where he finished as runner-up with 20.5m fan votes.
He joined Chinese boy group Nine Percent as a singer and was a member until the group split in late 2019. Having quickly built up a large fanbase with over 42m combined followers across social platforms.
He signed with UMGC as a solo artist in November 2019 and is also an ambassador for many global brands including Adidas NEO, Clear Shampoo and Yili Yogurt.
“We will continue to pave out the paths for Linong Chen and other Chinese talent to be heard by music fans globally, in the future.”
Sunny Chang, Universal Music Greater China
Sunny Chang, Chairman and CEO of Universal Music Greater China said: “At UMGC, it has always been our strategic priority and commitment to introduce talented local artists to music fans throughout China, but also to help Chinese music and our artists reach new global audiences through streaming platforms and label partners around the world.
“Linong Chen’s debut album has delivered breakthrough success in China, as well as making a steady step forward internationally, thanks to his recent collaboration with Hailee Steinfeld, and the support of our partners at Republic Records for that release.
“We will continue to pave out the paths for Linong Chen and other Chinese talent to be heard by music fans globally, in the future.”
“Linong Chen is a multi-talented young artist, who will be a great international ambassador to introduce C-pop music to fans around the world.”
Garand Wu, Universal Music China
Garand Wu, Managing Director, Universal Music China, added: “We are thrilled to celebrate the record-breaking success of Linong Chen’s debut album, which has already captivated audiences across China and many other Chinese pop music markets.
“Universal Music has always been an incubator for emerging artists around the world, with a number of global superstars joining UMG at a young age.
“It is a priority at UMGC to discover and support young artists, within the global structure of the world’s largest music company. Linong Chen is a multi-talented young artist, who will be a great international ambassador to introduce C-pop music to fans around the world.
“As we continue to work together on upcoming projects, I look forward to more success with UMG on both a local and global level.”
Andy Chang, A Legend Star Entertainment
Andy Chang, Linong Chen’s manager & CEO of A Legend Star Entertainment, said: “It is a great privilege for Linong Chen to partner with UMG, the world’s leading music company for the release of his debut album.
“The team at Universal Music Greater China have been extremely professional, creative and supportive, which has allowed him to fully focus on the creative process and an innovative and dynamic campaign around release.
“As we continue to work together on upcoming projects, I look forward to more success with UMG on both a local and global level.”Music Business Worldwide
