Robin Thicke Sells Only 550 Copies of 'Paula' in Canada

BY Gregory AdamsPublished Jul 9, 2014

The Robin Thicke backlash has been on for sometime now, but the R&B singer's fortunes have hit a new low as it's been revealed the guy's very much panned Paula LP sold but a dismal 550 copies in Canada in its first week.

According to Nielsen SoundScan Canada reports [via Huffington Post], the singer's song cycle, dedicated to estranged wife Paula, has moved but a fraction of what Thicke's Blurred Lines LP did last year. To put things in perspective, that album, which featured the controversial but mega-popular hit single of the same name, sold a whopping 13,000 copies in its first week, launching it to No. 1 in the charts.

Paula fared just as poorly in the UK, having sold just 530 copies, but the album hit sales of 25,000 down in the U.S. That's still a major dip, though, with Blurred Lines having pushed 177,000 units down south in its first week.

On top of his wife Paula leaving him, the last year has had the singer face claims of misogyny over "Blurred Lines," a lawsuit from Marvin Gaye's family regarding similarities between the late soul singer's material and Thicke's, a much-ridiculed MTV Awards performance with Miley Cyrus, and a petition to have his Juno nominations revoked over the singer's "blatant sexism, degradation of women and promotion of rape culture."

Exclaim! called Paula a "highly ill-advised effort" and an "artistic act of self-flagellation" steered by misguided tracks like "Get Her Back." The single also received a video treatment where an apparently beaten-up Thicke sends out a series of personal text messages to his wife ("I wrote a whole album about you").

UPDATE: According to reports, Paula sold less than 54 copies in its first week in Australia. Ouch!

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