Idolator
Call it a milestone of sorts: This week's top three albums on the Billboard 200 each sold more than 100,000 copies, with Musiq Soulchild pulling into the No. 1 spot after selling 149,000 copies of Luvanmusiq. Right behind him was the R & B crooner Lloyd, whose Street Love (which has one of our favorite singles so far this year) sold 144,000 copies.
Biggest Debuts: Six of the top ten records this week were first-timers. In addition to Musiq and Lloyd, D-throwing Rich Boy debuted at No. 3 and selling 112,000 copies of his self-titled debut; Neil Young sold 57,000 copies of Live At Massey Hall and entering at No. 6; Amy Winehouse moved 51,000 copies of Back To Black and debuted at No. 7; and 8-Ball & MJG's Ridin' High sold 50,000 copies, enough to land the No. 8 slot.
Biggest Slides: Last week's No. 1, the Notorious B.I.G.'s Greatest Hits, dropped to No. 15; the album behind it, the Arcade Fire's Neon Bible, took a dive to No. 18. (We're sure that it was appropriately dramatic.)
Charting The Decline: Today's report of the ever-softening CD market has inspired this new section, in which we compare this week's overall sales totals to those from a year ago. This week's tally of 8.50 million units sold is down 18.7% a year ago this week, during which 10.46 million CDs were sold; interestingly, though, the No. 20 album from each year (Corinne Bailey Rae in 2007, and Hawthorne Heights' If Only You Were Lonely in 2006) sold 34,000 copies.
Nickelback Award For Inexplicable Durability: The things you learn from reading Billboard.biz—like the fact that there are 22,000 fans of Type O Negative out there. Guess the cover of Metal Edge can still sell records!
Musiq, Lloyd Usher Six Big Debuts Onto Album Chart [Billboard]
Comments
Wow. I can't believe we live in a world where Musiq Soulchild can have a number one record.
Jill Scott, D'Angelo are you listening?! You, too, can have a number one record after a years-long hiatus! Get another new release out while the market's soft! Go, go!
Perhaps in the "charting the decline" you could add another bit of sales data from 5 years ago, to maybe give some further perspective.
Type O Negative put out a damn awesome album, their best in years. They may no longer be trying to expand their audience but their loyal (myself one of them) will still buy the records if they are good.
I think the last one did over 100,000.
based on his moniker, I have absolutely no problem illegally downloading Rich Boy's album. I'm like an mp3 Robin Hood.
Wait...Musiq Soulchild a)still has a record deal, b)has a number one album and c)said album sold more than 100,000 records it's first week? When are pestilence and famine scheduled to show up?
Cover of Metal edge and Decibel for Type O. They're fucking great, and they're from Brooklyn, not some band that moved to Brooklyn (God forbid they should get mainstream NYC coverage). "Dead Again" is terrific...
@beta.rogan: Perhaps in the "charting the decline" you could add another bit of sales data from 5 years ago, to maybe give some further perspective.
You wanna really bum us all out? Get the comparable-week sales from seven years ago - i.e., 2000, the peak of the CD-driven music biz. If memory serves, right around this week in that year, *N Sync released No Strings Attached and set that totally unrepeatable, never-again-in-our-lifetimes one-week record of 2.4m albums sold.
I knew Arcade Fire would see that kind of backlash.
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