Mac Miller’s last album Swimming has returned to the top 10 of the Billboard 200, following his death earlier this month. Swimming came out just three weeks prior to the rapper’s passing on September 7, and peaked in the No. 3 spot back in August. It now re-enters at No. 6, selling 67,000 units in the week after his reported overdose, a 634 percent increase in sales.
Last week, Billboard predicted a giant increase in the rapper’s streaming would put him back on the top of the charts. Streaming of his music skyrocketed 970 percent, rising to 32.5 million from 3.04 million the day before the news of his sudden death. Swimming also made its way to No. 1 on the Apple Music albums chart in the weekend after police found Miller in his home in San Fernando Valley.
Miller was only 26, and his death continues to hang over the music industry in the weeks that follow. Vince Staples posted a tribute to his late friend last week, while Schoolboy Q postponed his new album. J. Cole, Drake, Elton John, Childish Gambino, and others also dedicated shows to the late Pittsburgh rapper, known by so many as one of the kindest in the industry.
In the wake of his passing, it can only be expected that fans and friends, including Miller’s ex Ariana Grande, would be listening to his music as they cope with this tragic loss.
“Music was what he was put on this earth to make,” Rostrum Records founder Benjy Grinberg, who first signed Mac when he was 18, wrote in a tribute to the late artist. “He was a true visionary. As true as artists come.”
