Tyler, the Creator made a huge commercial splash with this year's CHROMAKOPIA, which had one of the biggest sales weeks of 2024 and topped the Billboard 200 for three consecutive weeks. That's particularly notable because he took a commercial risk by releasing the album on a Monday, rather than the industry-standard Friday, thereby missing three full days of tracking. Now, he has explained why.
"I kept telling n—s for a year and a half, 'Whatever I put out next, I'm putting that bitch out on a Monday,'" Tyler told Billboard. "I'm not doing that stupid Friday shit. We're putting that shit out on Monday and everyone's going to know about it."
The plan went even better than expected. "I knew people would be interested," he said. "But I didn't expect this."
Columbia Records exec Jen Mallory agreed, adding, "The hope was that people listened actively, not alongside thousands of other things that come out every Friday. Of course, shortening the release week is not an instinctive idea in today's market, but when you deliver the creative T did alongside the album — visual trailers, touring announcements, live events and more — it was undeniable. And the absolutely massive response indicates that his hypothesis was more than correct."
Previously, Tyler criticized the industry convention of releasing albums on a Friday. Last November, he said that the industry should go back to releasing on Tuesdays, which is what North America did up until 2015.
"I think we should put music out again on Tuesdays, instead of Fridays," he said in a 2023 Nardwuar interview. "My reasoning is: I know people think because of the weekend, they can listen to stuff and streams go up. And the streaming people are like, 'Oh, streams go up on the weekend.' But I think it's a lot of passive listening at parties, or people get the time to go to the gym, so they're not really listening."
He's not the only one — reunited Vancouver band P:ano recently released their album ba ba ba on a Tuesday as an intentional throwback to the old release model.