Just as we mentioned last week, it seems we now have some chart-toppers that are here to stay, at least for the time being. We've seen the first four artists below consistently on Charts Don't Lie since their respective albums dropped. All are steadily selling, and if they do decrease in sales, it isn't by a vast amount. We're also finally seeing the r'n'bers make their way off Charts, with Alicia Keys now sitting below T.I. (AK saw quite the drop from last week). It's nice to see so many hip-hop faces sprinkled through out the Billboard 200, however, it's possible we won't be seeing any new faces on there for awhile, as the more mainstream upcoming hip-hop LPs aren't dropping til March (i.e. Lil Wayne, Tyga etc).
We did get word on Joe Budden's projected album sales-- however they are not very strong, only 25-30k. It seemed like Joe had done a lot of promo, and gotten a lot of features on the project, so why do you guys think it's projected to sell so little? We know that indie artists are capable of selling huge-- Macklemore being a prime example. What do you think Joe is lacking? We'll have to see next week if Joe's sales are strong enough to get him onto the charts.
1) A$AP Rocky– Long.Live.A$AP: Rocky fell 6 spots from last week, as his album sales are decreasing steadily from its debut in January. This week Long.Live.A$AP turned out 23,372 copies, dropping almost 40% in sales.
2) Macklemore & Ryan Lewis– The Heist: The unstoppable indie force of Macklemore & Ryan Lewis were taking the charts by storm for a period of time, however, they have cooled down somewhat this week. From the #14 spot last week, they dropped to #17 this week. The Heist still moved 19,820 copies off shelves.
3) Rihanna– Unapologetic: Rih Rih remains unapologetic at #18 this week, that’s a jump from last week’s #21, moving around 18k. The Barbados singer has been showing a lot of her ‘unapologetic’ side recently, accompanying her one-time abuser, Chris Brown to court during his recent legal troubles. We’ll have to see if her determination to stay by Chris’ side affects her LP sales.
4) Kendrick Lamar– good kid, m.A.A.d city: K. Dot saw a drop in his sales last week, but this week he managed to increase sales by 1%, thus landing the #19 spot on the charts. We’ve seen good kid, m.A.A.d city on the charts for quite some time, we’ll have to wait and see if we have another consistent seller like 2 Chainz on our hands.
5) T.I. – Trouble Man: Heavy Is The Head: Tip’s eighth studio album, Trouble Man, did well initially and has since been slowly climbing down the charts. This week T.I. nabs the #34 spot with 13,437 units sold.
This week coming in near the latter half of the charts is Swizz Beatz' wife, Alicia Keys, with Girl On Fire making a drop from #18 to #36. Further below her is Wiz Khalifa, who may be too preoccupied with Amber Rose's upcoming pregnancy to notice he is now sitting at #50, having only moved 7,820k. Not to forget the pop/r'n'b star, Bruno Mars, who is still nearer the top 5 of the charts with Unorthodox Jukebox selling around 39k.
