SEOUL -- Girl band TWICE has topped Billboard's top 200 popular albums chart with its album "With YOU-th." The nine-member band became the third K-pop girl group to secure the top position on the album chart, following BLACKPINK and New Jeans.
The album, released on February 23, arrived atop the list on the Billboard 200 chart with 95,000 equivalent album units sold in the United States in the week ending February 29. The ranking is confirmed based on the number of album sales, track equivalent album (TEA), and streaming equivalent album (SEA).
"As With YOU-th is mostly in the Korean language, it is the 24th mostly non-English language album to hit No. 1, and the first of 2024," Billboard said on its website. With YOU-th competed against other top-selling albums, such as American singer Morgan Wallen's "One Thing At A Time" and "Vultures 1" by two American artists -- Ye and Ty Dolla $ign.
TWICE, which debuted in 2015, is especially popular in Japan. On Billboard Japan, the K-pop girl group ranked fifth in the Top Artist category of the 2019 year-end rankings. To consolidate its position in the island country, the group's agency JYP Entertainment formed TWICE's first sub-unit in July 2023 consisting of three Japanese members -- Mina, Sana, and Momo.
In February 2020, JYP partnered with Republic Records, an American record label that includes Taylor Swift and Ariana Grande, to diversify the market through TWICE. In October 2021, TWICE released its first English single, "The Feels" targeting the North American market.
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