TWICE secured a new record for themselves on the Billboard 200, where their latest album, "THIS IS FOR", has stayed for a personal best of twelve consecutive weeks. This achievement defies expectations as the group's sales have suffered amidst a general industry decline, with the nonet last peaking via their EP "READY TO BE" more than two years ago.

For those unaware, the Billboard 200 is a ranking of the top 200 most popular albums per week in the United States. In Kpop-terms, fans usually look at it as a measure of the number of copies that each album has sold in the country. So with this breakthrough, TWICE having their best ever run on the chart is a sure sign that their sales have overcome the slump, right? Well... probably not. Have a look at Figure 1:

Figure 1. TWICE's recent album sales (dark blue line) versus how long each of them stayed on the Billboard 200 (orange line). The lines are correlated for all releases except "THIS IS FOR". Sales numbers are from koreansalestwt, chart numbers are from Billboard. The orange line has been amplified by 100,000 to be visible on the graph.

In the figure, the number of weeks that each of the group's albums have stayed on the Billboard 200 (orange line) is correlated with the amount of copies sold per album (dark blue line). Oddly however, "THIS IS FOR" not only bucks the trend, but the value for the number of weeks ends up in a higher position than the amount of copies sold. If the it's sales aren't doing so great, why is it breaking TWICE's record?

Clever use of chart mechanics

The reason is because TWICE have something of a double-dipping thing going on. Not only is "THIS IS FOR" out and performing as TWICE albums usually do, but they also have two other songs on the soundtrack for the hit Netflix movie Kpop Demon Hunters: "TAKEDOWN" and "Strategy". That film's music has been doing gangbusters on the charts, including spending 15 weeks on the Billboard 200 — often in second place, but now hitting first in recent weeks.

The track to pay attention to here is "TAKEDOWN", as the TWICE version of that song is found on both the movie's soundtrack, and also on the deluxe version of "THIS IS FOR". So, whenever someone listens to it, it counts towards both albums on the chart (Figure 2). And even though TWICE may have a large following that can carry their music pretty far, it's this double-dipping property of "TAKEDOWN" which generates an unsual level of longevity on the Billboard 200 for "THIS IS FOR".

Figure 2. Separate listings for "TAKEDOWN" share stream counts. Playing the song on either album counts for both of them. Screenshots taken from Spotify.

The broader context

While "TAKEDOWN" accounts for a large amount of the streaming success of "THIS IS FOR", the rest of the songs are no slouches either as they add up to almost half of it's total streams. At the time of writing this article, the title track, also called "THIS IS FOR", brings in over 500k daily streams versus 1300k for "TAKEDOWN". "MARS", the best performing b-side (and my personal favorite on the album) follows in third with 100k daily.

Of course, while TWICE's newfound charting success is correlated with Kpop Demon Hunters, this doesn't mean that the album is being wholly carried by the movie's soundtrack as attested above, but merely that it's just riding the wave of popularity accompanying the film. Regardless of the outcome of the movie or it's music, TWICE are famous for being an incredibly active group, which is very apparent in Figure 3. The release of "THIS IS FOR", their concert tour, Lollapalooza performance, and "TEN: The Story Goes On" album all generated significant interest for the JYPE stars on top of them enjoying the fruits of the animated collaboration. And as the soundtrack is slowly fading away from the public's attention, TWICE remains in focus, with the women now seeing a rejuvenated interest amongst Americans that they haven't seen since their 2023 "READY TO BE" tour.

Figure 3. Google search trends for TWICE (blue line) versus the soundtrack for Kpop Demon Hunters (red line) in the United States. A = Kpop Demon Hunters film and soundtrack release; B = "THIS IS FOR" release; C = TWICE concert tour begins; D = TWICE perform at Lollapalooza Chicago; E = "TEN: The Story Goes On" album and concert tour announcements.

Implications for the future

With TWICE finding such success from their collab, we may see others make similar attempts down the road, which could be an especially great way to gain a foothold in the US for idols that struggle there. We've already seen fans express an interest in who will be on the soundtrack for a potential Kpop Demon Hunters sequel, so there's definitely room for more groups to ride the wave too, whether its with the same franchise or a different one. Expect more collaborations in the future.