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\n\tIt\u2019s been a massive year for new releases from huge artists \u2014 and with the first-week returns for her Short n\u2019 Sweet<\/em> album, Sabrina Carpenter has now proven herself as big as nearly any of \u2019em. <\/p>\n \n\tThe new LP \u2014 officially Carpenter\u2019s sixth, but just her second since leaving the Disney-owned Hollywood Records for Island \u2014 launches atop the Billboard 200 (dated Sept. 17) this week with 362,000 first-week units, making it the year\u2019s third-biggest bow (after Taylor Swift\u2019s The Tortured Poets Department<\/em> and Beyonc\u00e9\u2019s Cowboy Carter<\/em>). Meanwhile, the album launches all 10 of its brand new tracks onto the top half of the Hot 100 \u2014 where pre-release singles \u201cEspresso\u201d and \u201cPlease Please Please\u201d have long lived \u2014 led by the No. 2 entrance of new single \u201cTaste.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tHow did Sabrina Carpenter work her way up to these A-list numbers? And what do we think of Short n\u2019 Sweet<\/em> beyond the big hits? Billboard<\/em> staffers answer these questions and more below. <\/p>\n \n\t1. Sabrina Carpenter scores her best week (and then some) with 362,000 first-week units for Short n\u2019 Sweet \u2013 the third-best first-week mark of the year for any artist \u2014 while also charting all 12 tracks within the Hot 100\u2019s top 50. On a scale from 1-10, how big a triumph are those first-week stats for Carpenter? <\/strong><\/p>\n \n\tHannah Dailey<\/strong>: That\u2019s an absolute 10, especially considering that before this era, she hadn\u2019t even broken into the top 20 of either chart. She\u2019s worked for so long for this moment and played all her cards exactly right this year to build hype leading up to the Short n\u2019 Sweet <\/em>era. It\u2019s an incredible feat, and she and her team should be very proud.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tStephen Daw<\/strong>: 10, easily. Had this just been her first No. 1 album, this moment would have already been a pretty big deal for Sabrina \u2014 to have\u00a0Short n\u2019 Sweet\u00a0<\/em>rake in\u00a0such massive numbers\u00a0and<\/em>\u00a0debut all of its songs within the chart\u2019s top 50 makes it a monumental success for her.<\/p>\n \n\tKristin Robinson<\/strong>: 10! I don\u2019t think any artist could ask for a better roll out than this one. Every new single\/focus track has been as big if not bigger than the one before it. The music videos captured the cultural zeitgeist, and she has become an artist that pretty much everyone has been rooting for. Any artist, whether they\u2019ve been famous for 10 years or one year, would be lucky to have so much success. I think her good fortune will continue as well. If you check TikTok, it seems that fans are not just connecting to the top songs \u2014 they are obsessing over the deeper cuts too. That is always a great sign that the full album has legs.<\/p>\n \n\tAndrew Unterberger<\/strong>: It is indeed a 10. If you told me a year ago (hell, if you told me six months ago) that Sabrina had posted a 36,200-unit week in her new album\u2019s first frame \u2014 literally one-tenth of what she ended up doing with Short n\u2019 Sweet<\/em> \u2014 I would\u2019ve said that was a great showing for her. To outpace some of the artists who have been the very pace-setters for some of the music Carpenter is making in this album is just jaw-dropping, and an unqualified win for all involved. <\/p>\n \n\tChristine Werthman<\/strong>: I\u2019m withholding the 10 for if she\u2019d bested everyone this year, but I\u2019ll still go big with a 9.\u00a0The numbers alone are impressive, but the biggest triumph to me is that this is her sixth studio album, and she\u2019s finally breaking through in a massive way. It is far from the norm nowadays for most artists to\u00a0toil away and eventually reach this level of success, especially in pop. Props to her and similarly long-building labelmate Chappell Roan for sticking with it. \u00a0<\/p>\n \n\t2. In a year full of major releases from major pop stars \u2013 Billie Eilish, Ariana Grande, Post Malone, Ye, many others \u2013 Carpenter\u2019s 2024 first-week number passes everyone outside of pop\u2019s arguable two contemporary leading lights, Taylor Swift and Beyonc\u00e9. What is the biggest reason you think SnS was able to outperform so many huge releases, at just 12 tracks with no features?<\/strong> <\/p>\n \n\tHannah Dailey<\/strong>: She worked meticulously to make sure that people would have every reason to tune in once Short n\u2019 Sweet <\/em>dropped, from capitalizing on her clicky romance with Barry Keoghan to keeping her branding focused and consistent with what\u2019s been working for her this past year. She also chose three excellent singles to lead the album \u2014 \u201cEspresso,\u201d \u201cPlease Please Please\u201d and \u201cTaste\u201d \u2014\u00a0and paired them with music videos that allowed her personality and charisma to shine through.\u00a0All of this made for a really fresh, polished rollout that followed a more traditional pop star format that people seemed to really resonate with.<\/p>\n \n\tStephen Daw<\/strong>: It ultimately boils down to the joint success stories of \u201cEspresso\u201d and \u201cPlease Please Please,\u201d I think. Timing is tricky in the modern music business, especially with how capricious viral success can be on the charts. But the stars really aligned for Sabrina \u2014 after years building up her reputation as pop music\u2019s next main character, she managed to score her first two top five hits on the Hot 100 within a month of one another. Once she had that momentum going, there was almost no way to stop her from storming the charts like this.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tKristin Robinson<\/strong>: I think first and foremost, the songs are well-crafted, upbeat and infectious. This should come as no surprise, given the number of hitmakers that helped her put it together. Then secondly, you can tell Sabrina put in the work to get here. These kinds of successes are never an accident: It requires extreme effort and dedication on the artist\u2019s part to constantly try to stay in front of their audiences. I don\u2019t think we got nearly as many interviews, music videos, live shows, festival sets, promotional bits, etc. from Billie, Ariana, Post and Ye.<\/p>\n \n\tAndrew Unterberger<\/strong>: Sabrina has just nailed all of the small things over the course of the past six months \u2014 everything from the music videos to the release schedule to the live performances to specific lyrical details \u2014 in a way that built momentum organically but purposefully leading up to Short n\u2019 Sweet<\/em>. And perhaps most importantly, in the weeks leading up to the album, she pulled back a little: It never felt like the album had come out before the album actually came out, which is a trap a lot of her peers can\u2019t help themselves from falling into. (Well, her one-time peers anyway, her current peer list is rapidly dwindling.)<\/p>\n \n\tChristine Werthman<\/strong>: Perhaps the answer is in the title: Short n\u2019 Sweet<\/em>. Although, to play my own contrarian, just because an album is short doesn\u2019t mean it\u2019ll be an easy listen. The key is that Carpenter gives the people what they want \u2014 quippy one-liners, bedroom eyes, vocal trills \u2014 and while she might vary the packaging (\u201cCoincidence,\u201d \u201cBed Chem,\u201d\u00a0\u201cSlim Pickins\u201d) those elements are always present. After six albums, Carpenter has homed in on her strengths, and these songs play to them over 36 delightful minutes.<\/p>\n