With a host of major new releases hitting shelves last week in time for post-Thanksgiving shopping, Jay-Z’s “Kingdom Come” came out on top of The Billboard 200. The Roc-A-Fella/Def Jam set moved a whopping 680,000 copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan, the ex-retiree’s biggest sales week ever, as well as his ninth No. 1 on the chart. He thusly ties the Rolling Stones for the third-most No. 1s, behind the Beatles with 19 and Elvis Presley with 10.
“American Idol” season five finalist Chris Daughtry, whose band goes by his surname, lands at No. 2 with his self-titled 19 Recordings/RCA debut, which sold 304,000. The Sony BMG Strategic Marketing Group/EMI/Universal/Zomba hits compilation “NOW 23” keeps the No. 3 spot warm for a second week, selling 289,000, a sales boost of 49%.
The Beatles’ “Love” (Apple Corps Ltd./Capitol) bows with 272,000 at No. 4. Since 1994, the quartet has placed 10 entries on The Billboard 200, including four No. 1s: the three “Anthology” sets plus “1.” “Love” serves as the soundtrack to Cirque du Soleil’s Las Vegas show of the same name and features new variations on classic Beatles material.
Snoop Dogg earns his ninth top 10 album with “Tha Blue Carpet Treatment” (Doggystyle/Geffen) at No. 5 with 264,000. Sales were fueled in part by the single “I Wanna Love You,” performed by Akon and featuring Snoop. The track also appears on Akon’s “Konvicted,” which debuted last week at No. 1 but falls to No. 8 with 164,000. It was the only record in the top 10 to post a sales decrease (-42%).
Beyonce’s “B’Day” experiences a major bounce back into the upper echelons of the chart, moving 9-6 with a 154% sales swell to 173,000 units. The soundtrack to Disney’s “Hannah Montana” enjoys a 47% lift to 167,000 but still drops 5-7. Late rapper Tupac Shakur’s “Pac’s Life” (Amaru/Interscope) enters at No. 9 with 159,000, his 14th entry on The Billboard 200 since his 1996 murder.
Rounding out the top 10, Keith Urban’s Capitol Nashville release “Love, Pain & the Whole Crazy Thing” drops 6-10 despite a 51% sales increase to 157,000.
U2’s singles collection “U218: Singles” (Interscope) debuts at No. 12 with 134,000, while Latin group RBD earns its biggest chart week yet, moving 117,000 copies of the EMI Televisa set “Celestial” at No. 15. It’s also the best sales week for a Spanish-language album since Shakira’s “Fijacion Oral Vol. 1” moved 157,000 when it started at No. 4 last year. Neo-classical quartet Il Divo’s “Siempre” (Columbia) debuts at No. 17 with 108,000, its fourth top 20 album in just over a-year-and-a-half.
Two rock albums, Brand New’s “The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me” (Interscope) and Killswitch Engage’s “As Daylight Dies” (Roadrunner) open at No. 31 and No. 32, respectively, with 60,000 each.
Other big debuts include Tom Waits’ triple-disc “Orphans: Brawler, Bawlers & Bastards” (No. 74, 21,000), “The Bad Boy” by Hector “El Father” (No. 81, 20,000), New Age artist Loreena McKennitt’s “An Ancient Muse” (No. 83, 19,000), the second volume of the “NOW Latino” compilation (No. 84, 19,000), Patti LaBelle’s “The Gospel According to Patti LaBelle” (No. 86, 18,000) and Oasis’ hits collection “Stop the Clocks (Best Of)” (No. 89, 18,000).
Overall, the heavy shopping week pushed 162 titles on the chart to sales gains over the previous week. CD sales are up 36% from last week’s count and are flat compared to the same week a year ago at 17.02 million units. Sales for 2006 are down 5% compared to 2005 at 485.7 million units.
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