Chart Beat
Meek Mill’s ‘Pain’ Posts No. 2 Debut on Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums Chart
Beyond those titles, he’s also landed two more EPs on Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums. 2018’s Legends of the Summer peaked at No. 8, while 2020’s Quarantine Pack managed a No. 22 best. Pain also debuts at No. 2 on the Top Rap Albums chart, where, as on Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums, it trails Drake’s Certified Lover Boy. On the all-genre Billboard 200, Pain enters at No. 3, behind Taylor Swift’s Fearless (Taylor’s Version) and Drake’s Boy. As with most hip-hop releases, streaming constitutes the majority of Pain’s debut sum: 82,000 units of the 95,000 start derive from the streaming sector, representing 110.5 million on-demand streams of the album’s songs. The nine-figure total makes the rapper’s album the second-most streamed title of the week, after Drake’s Boy. Thanks to its strong stream...
Elton John Sets U.K. Chart Record With ‘Cold Heart’
With his latest feat, Elton eclipses the efforts of five other music greats – Elvis Presley, Cher, Cliff Richard, Michael Jackson and David Bowie – all of whom landed at least one Top 10 single in five different decades. Across his glittering career, Elton has been crowned on the Official U.K. Singles Chart on seven occasions. He could stretch that tally to eight with “Cold Heart,” which leads the midweek chart and is poised to usurp “Ed Sheeran’s “Shivers” after three weeks at No. 2. “Cold Heart” is lifted from John’s forthcoming collaborative studio album, The Lockdown Sessions, set for release Oct. 22. In his homeland, John has 32 Top 10 albums, with seven hitting the summit. His last LP to reach No. 1 was 2012’s Good Morning to the Night, Pnau’s mashup of his classic songs. The Officia...
Maneskin Scores First Rock & Alternative Airplay No. 1 With ‘Beggin”
Måneskin is the first act in 2021 to land its premier Rock & Alternative Airplay ruler and the first since All Time Low, whose “Monsters,” featuring blackbear, hit No. 1 in September 2020. “Beggin'” is Måneskin’s second Rock & Alternative Airplay entry; “I Wanna Be Your Slave” hit No. 28 in August and ranks at No. 47 on the latest survey (708,000 in audience). Concurrently, “Beggin'” spends a second week at No. 1 on Alternative Airplay and is bubbling under the Adult Alternative Airplay ranking. The song by the Italian quartet, which won the 2021 Eurovision Song Contest with “Zitti e buoni,” continues rising at pop radio, bulleting at its No. 6 high on Pop Airplay and pushing 16-14 on Adult Pop Airplay. It ...
All-Star ‘The Metallica Blacklist’ Tribute Hits Top 10 on Billboard’s Top Album Sales Chart
Billboard’s Top Album Sales chart ranks the top-selling albums of the week based only on traditional album sales. The chart’s history dates back to May 25, 1991, the first week Billboard began tabulating charts with electronically monitored piece count information from SoundScan, now MRC Data. Pure album sales were the measurement solely utilized by the Billboard 200 albums chart through the list dated Dec. 6, 2014, after which that chart switched to a methodology that blends album sales with track equivalent album units and streaming equivalent album units. For all chart news, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both Twitter and Instagram. Of The Metallica Blacklist’s sales of 8,000 in the latest tracking week, physical album sales comprise effectively all of that sum. The CD editio...
17-Year-Old Iván Cornejo Continues Trend of Teens in Top 10 on Regional Mexican Albums Chart
Alma concurrently gives the Riverside, Calif.-born singer his first Top Latin Albums visit with a No. 11 debut. The set, released Aug. 20 via Manzana Records, earned 9.4 million on-demand streams of the album’s songs in its opening week. “The most challenging aspect of the recording process for me is probably the synchronization of instruments and vocals,” Cornejo adds. “Usually when I’m improvising and coming up with new songs, I’m in the comfort of my room just jamming with my cousin; but once we step foot in the studio, everything is more surreal and amplified mistakes can be more noticeable, and all I want to create is something perfect, that I’m proud of.” Cornejo’s recent popularity is fueled by his strong TikTok presence. He took a first shot ...
Five Burning Questions: Wizkid’s ‘Essence’ With Tems and Justin Bieber Hits Hot 100’s Top 10
1. “Essence” finally reaching the Hot 100’s top 10 in its 14th week in the chart feels like a big moment for not only the artists involved, but for Afrobeats as a global genre. On a scale from 1-10, how would you rate the musical and cultural importance of the song going top 10? Carl Lamarre: 9.5. I think people forget that Wiz’s Made in Lagos album dropped Oct. 2020. So, the fact that people were so late to the party on the album and “Essence” is beyond criminal. And in some respects, it’s even more disrespectful that so many needed a Bieber appearance for people to appreciate the richness of “Essence.” Either way, I think this record propelling into the national spotlight bodes well for a rising genre lookin...
Sam Fender’s ‘Seventeen Going Under’ Opens Healthy Lead In U.K. Chart Race
It’s the outright leader on the midweek chart, and is outselling the rest of the Top 10 combined, according to the OCC. Fender’s set has a lead of 20,000 chart sales over his closest competitor, Drake’s Certified Lover Boy (OVO/Republic Records). Also impacting the Official Chart Update is Trivium, whose tenth album In The Court of the Dragon (Roadrunner) swoops in at No. 3. If it holds its course, Dragon will give the U.S. metal band their second U.K. Top 10 and a peak entry. Electronic artist James Blake could also net a career-best chart position with Friends That Break Your Heart (Polydor), new at No. 5. Based on midweek data, fresh sets from Johnny Flynn (Lost In Cedar Wood at No. 11 via Transgressive) and We Are Scientists (Huffy at No. 15 via 100 Percent Records) are eying Top...
The Script Notch Sixth U.K. No. 1 Album
With their sixth No. 1, The Script join an elite club of rock bands that includes Arctic Monkeys, Genesis, Pink Floyd, Kings Of Leon, Radiohead, Blur and Muse. The Specials blast in at No. 2 with Protest Songs 1924-2012 (Island), for the ska legends’ fifth U.K. Top 10 album, while Queen drummer Roger Taylor hits his first solo U.K. Top 10 with his sixth record Outsider (EMI), new at No. 3. Also new to the current frame is Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga’s sophomore duets effort, Love For Sale (Interscope), debuting No. 6. Hans Zimmer cuts a slice of history with his soundtrack to the new James Bond film No Time To Die (Decca). The album bows at No. 7 on the weekly chart, to become the highest-charting Bond title in the franchise’s history. The LP’s title track, led by Billie Eilish and featurin...
Taylor Swift’s ‘Fearless (Taylor’s Version)’ Returns to No. 1 on Billboard 200
Of Fearless (Taylor’s Version)’s 152,000 equivalent album units earned in the U.S. in the week ending Oct. 7, album sales comprise 146,000 (up 15,807%), SEA units comprise 6,000 (down 1%, equaling 8.72 million streams of the album’s tracks) and TEA units comprise a negligible number. Of the 146,000 copies sold for the week, CD sales comprise 77,000, while vinyl LP sales total 67,000. The album sold about 1,000 in cassettes and 1,000 in digital downloads, too. (The album was discounted at digital retail, which spurred a 268% increase in digital album sales, but only 1,000 copies sold for the week.) Strikingly, 29% of the album’s to-date CD sales were generated in the week ending Oct. 7, concurrent with the availability of its signed CD. The signed CD was only sold via Swift’s webstore, for ...
Tony Bennett & Lady Gaga’s ‘Love for Sale’ Launches Atop Jazz Charts & In Billboard 200 Top 10
The Billboard 200 chart ranks the most popular albums of the week in the U.S. based on multi-metric consumption as measured in equivalent album units. Units comprise album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA). Each unit equals one album sale, or 10 individual tracks sold from an album, or 3,750 ad-supported or 1,250 paid/subscription on-demand official audio and video streams generated by songs from an album. All of the Oct. 16, 2021-dated charts will be posted in full on Billboard‘s website on Oct. 12. For all chart news, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both Twitter and Instagram. Love for Sale starts with 41,000 equivalent album units earned in the U.S. in the week ending Oct. 7, according to MRC Data. Of that sum, album sal...
The Kid Laroi and Justin Bieber’s ‘Stay’ Snags 13th Week at No. 1 In Australia
The highest-placed debut this week belongs to homegrown band Rancid Eddie, whose controversial song “Dry” (Independent) starts at No. 17. “Dry” has been a hot talking point in Australia’s music press throughout the week, with some artists and observers slamming its lyrical content as harmful and misogynistic. The band responded with a statement in which its members admitted to exploring “the dark sides of relationships in our lyrics” though “oppose hatred or violence of any kind against women.” Over on the ARIA Albums Chart, Drake’s Certified Lover Boy (Universal) returns to No. 1 for a third non-consecutive week at the top, equaling Scorpion (July 2018) as the Canadian rapper’s longest stint at the penthouse. Meanwhile, Taylor Swi...
ITZY’s ‘Crazy in Love: The 1st Album’ Debuts at No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Album Sales Chart
Billboard’s Top Album Sales chart ranks the top-selling albums of the week based only on traditional album sales. The chart’s history dates back to May 25, 1991, the first week Billboard began tabulating charts with electronically monitored piece count information from SoundScan, now MRC Data. Pure album sales were the measurement solely utilized by the Billboard 200 albums chart through the list dated Dec. 6, 2014, after which that chart switched to a methodology that blends album sales with track equivalent album units and streaming equivalent album units. For all chart news, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both Twitter and Instagram. Of Crazy in Love: The 1st Album’s sales of 22,000, physical album sales comprise 21,000 (all from CD sales) and 1,000 via digital download....
