Did the Kanye West Incident Help Taylor Swift’s Career?

By Christopher John Farley

WSJ

At the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards, rapper Kanye West famously interrupted Tyler Swift’s acceptance speech for the best female video award to declare that Beyoncé deserved the honor. Swift was widely viewed as the victim, West came off to many people as the villain.

But did West actually help Swift’s career?

According to Nielsen SoundScan, the country singer’s first album, 2006’s “Taylor Swift,” sold 4,821,000 albums (plus 10,760,000 digital songs from the album). Her second album, 2008’s “Fearless,” sold 6,027,000 albums (plus 15,165,000 digital songs from the album) and, in the wake of the incident, became the best-selling album of 2009.

Swift’s music was already selling well pre-West. But post-West, her profile was raised even higher.

(More here.)