How Kesha Topped Multiple Charts With Her Independent Debut

In 2023, Kesha completed her yearslong record deal with Kemosabe and RCA with the release of her experimental pop album, Gag Order. After its release, she parted ways with her longtime management, Vector. And by the start of 2024, she was ready for her next chapter: freedom. 

In February 2024, Kesha signed a new management deal with Crush (Miley Cyrus, Lorde). And fittingly, this July 4, she released her first album, . (Period), with the new team intact – and her first as an independent artist, releasing on her own Kesha Records and distributed by ADA.

“I am full of so much gratitude. Thank you for supporting me,” Kesha recently wrote on Instagram. “As an independent artist, I’m really floored by the amount of love and support yall are giving me.”

Crush CMO Dan Kruchkow recalls meeting the pop star for the first time, saying: “You could immediately tell her ambition, vision and competitiveness were not lacking in the least. That’s a very good first impression in our book.”

And it’s helped her deliver, big time. .(Period) debuted atop multiple Billboard charts and has placed Kesha on the biggest stages of her career, including tour stops at New York’s Madison Square Garden and Los Angeles’ Forum.

“We are as ambitious as she is and the goal was to make everything bigger than [it had] previously been,” says Kruchkow. “We’ve checked quite a few boxes off the last 12 months.”

“It’s been really exciting to see both her lifelong fans and all aspects of the industry join Kesha in this new phase of her career,” he continues, crediting press, streamers, radio, social media partnerships and fashion and beauty collaborators for supporting the artist throughout this rollout. “It was all a risk, but there’s no reward without that and now it’s only going to get bigger.”

This week, Kesha’s first independently-released album debuted at No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Album Sales, Vinyl Albums and Top Dance Albums charts. What key decision(s) did you make to help make that happen?

For starters, launching her first ever independent release as a surprise on July 4 set it off real quick. But the result is a culmination of well over a year of planning and executing on Kesha’s vision. Her having the freedom to do whatever she wanted (godbless ADA!) was a huge driver of the plan. We have no guardrails, which for us at least, makes it very fun and empowering. 

She earned her career best sales week on vinyl. What was the strategy and why was vinyl a priority?

This all started with a fantastic album. Then you add in Keshas’s creative behind the packaging, colors and even the names (which are definitely NSFW). And finally, now that vinyl’s become a super viable and important format again, this all made the perfect combination of physical release for super fans.  Fans want to own something, collect it, play it, show it off. And they are.

This was her first rollout with a new team — what challenges and opportunities did that bring?

The obvious challenge is that its new for everyone and we had to establish systems and all the boring stuff but once that locked in we approached everything with the concept of no idea is too big or too crazy. We’ll figure it out. Nothing is off limits.

Kesha is headlining some of the biggest stages of her career — including the Forum and, next week, Madison Square Garden. What made now the right moment to take on these iconic venues?

For starters, she made an incredible record that we knew her fans, new and old, would love. The early signs were there once we started releasing new music. Her catalog quickly started to react as well and hasn’t stopped since. A surprise appearance at Coachella and major set at Lollapalooza last summer really locked in the potential we all saw. The fans were hungry. All that, coupled with Kesha’s new freedom and personal ambition, we knew we could take risks — and booking her biggest headline tour ever was one of them. Our partners at CAA and Live Nation delivered big time and now Kesha is playing to these tremendous crowds — 22k sold out in Chicago, sold out MSG, 18k sold out at opening night in Salt Lake. It’s a freight train.

What’s next for Kesha?

World domination! She’s hitting the UK and EU to play to her biggest headline crowds ever there next year with more territories to be announced soon. On the music side of things, we’re really just getting started and have already released a deluxe album. There’s several songs we’re working at the moment in different ways and we might have more to come sooner than later. Expect to see Kesha very busy for a long time to come.

Last Week: How Royel Otis Readied Their First Billboard No. 1