It has been for sale, on and off, since its release.
Kanye West’s The Life of Pablo is reportedly the first streaming-only album to go platinum, Pitchfork reports.
“[Kanye West] becomes the first artist to scale this era’s highest musical plateau, as his universally acclaimed masterwork The Life of Pablo becomes the first streaming-only album ever to achieve RIAA platinum certification for consumption of over 1 million equivalent units,” Fake Shore Drive reports, presumably quoting from a press release.
The Life of Pablo was originally released as a Tidal exclusive, both streaming and very briefly for purchase. The album is currently available as $20 digital download on Kanye West’s own website and, according to a Billboard report from April 10 of last year, TLOP was able to debut at the top of the album charts after it was given a wide release because of track-equivalent album streams (10 track streams = one album purchased) and streaming-equivalent albums, as well as direct album sales: “The set earning 94,000 equivalent album units in the week ending April 7 [2016], according to Nielsen Music. Of that sum, 28,000 were in pure album sales — the rest were in streaming equivalent albums.”
