Morgan Wallen's extraordinary 12-week run at #1 will be ended this week—by labelmate Taylor Swift. The latter has once again pushed the marketing envelope with a slate of new Midnights offerings, mobilizing the ever-ready army of Swifties. Her new "Karma" remix f/Ice Spice, meanwhile, immediately commanded the top of the Spotify chart, not to mention the conversation.

Republic is once again knocking the cover off the ball, with a stunning 12.3 in current YD marketshare. House Lipman's hold on the U.S. chart’s Top 10 is poised to further tighten through the remainder of 2023. The label has the #1, #3, #4, #5 and #7 as well as the #11, #15, #16 and #18 releases of the YTD Top 20 albums, with more superstar releases on the way. Monte Lipman has emerged as the biz's consummate dealmaker, possessing both a great nose for the deal and an unbeatable capacity to close—not to mention that innate ability to know when to go for it. The highly competitive signing of Anitta is the latest example of his success ratio on the risk-reward spectrum.

And the year's not even half over yet.

Among the successes latterly achieved by the company that, according to legend, began on Monte and Avery Lipman's kitchen table: Morgan Wallen’s latest, One Thing at a Time (Republic/Big Loud), which has nested at #1 for the last 11 consecutive weeks and has done 2.6m+ YTD (and 3.2m in ATD). The album’s monster single, “Last Night,” became Wallen’s first chart-topper and has earned 281m+ global streams on Spotify alone. The country phenom's prior full-length, Dangerous: The Double Album, has done nearly 900k YTD and is nearing 7.6m ATD.

The redoubtable Swift, meanwhile, released Midnights in the fourth quarter of 2022; it's done north of 1.2m YTD and is well past 4.5m in ATD, led by enormous streams for “Anti-Hero,” now at around 850m at Spotify. Seven months later, the project remains among the Top 10 albums of 2023, alongside two Wallen sets and two other Republic releases, Metro Boomin’s Heroes & Villains (approaching 900k YTD) and Drake and 21 Savage’s joint album, Her Loss (750k+ YTD).

At Spotify, Midnights crushed the first-day record for streams of an album, with 88m U.S. and 185m worldwide. Swift also broke first-day records at Apple Music and Amazon Music. The singer-songwriter and bona fide force of nature is also in the middle of a massive international tour. During a recent stop in Nashville, she announced Speak Now (Taylor's Version), will be released on 7/7. If history is any guide, the Swifties brigade will hoist this one to great heights as well.

The Weeknd, another of Republic’s juggernauts, released The Highlights (XO/Republic) greatest hits project in 2021, and it continues to bounce around the Top 20, as does 2016’s Starboy. Four Weeknd titles have collectively amassed 1.4m YTD. Meanwhile, Post Malone has that announced his next album, Austin (Mercury/Republic), will drop on 7/28. A new single, “Mourning,” arrived on 5/19 and has collected about 16m global Spotify streams.

On our most recent Top 50 chart, Republic not only three of the Top 4 but also has 10 albums in the Top 30.

Of course, given that this is Monte Lipman’s company we’re talking about, he’s probably asking his team why they don’t have 15.