Wednesday 20 April 2005

Carey's comeback album opens at no. 1

Notching the best opening sales week of her career with her eighth studio album, "The Emancipation of Mimi" (Island/IDJMG), Mariah Carey finally unseats 50 Cent from the top post on The Billboard 200. "Mimi" moved 404,000 copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan, putting her well ahead of 50 Cent's long-reigning "The Massacre," as well as new albums by Mudvayne and Garbage.

Carey last reached The Billboard 200 summit in 1997 with "Butterfly" (Columbia), which started with 235,000 copies and has sold 3.7 million to date. Hailed in advertisements as "the return of the voice", Carey's latest is considered by many to be a comeback for the once untouchable superstar. In 2002, her Island debut "Charmbracelet" managed a No. 3 opening with 241,000 copies and has so far sold 1.1 million. That set followed a brief stint at Virgin that was marked by the much-maligned all-Carey soundtrack to the universally panned film "Glitter".

Mudvayne scores the best sales week of its career with "Lost and Found" (Epic), which moved 152,000 copies to open at No. 2. The band's fourth album features its biggest airplay hit, "Happy?" which is No. 2 this week on Billboard's Mainstream Rock Tracks list. The new set follows 2002's "The End of All Things to Come", which opened at No. 17 with sales of 79,000 copies; it has sold 680,000 to date.

After six weeks on top, "The Massacre" (Shady/Aftermath/Interscope) falls to No. 3 on a 15% sales slip to 140,000 copies. One slot lower, Garbage earns the first top 10 album of its career with "Bleed Like Me" (Geffen), an improvement over the No. 13 opening for 2001's "Beautiful Garbage" (Almo Sounds/Interscope). Despite the disparity in chart positions, first week sales of 75,000 for "Bleed" are not that far ahead of the 73,000 copies initially moved by "Beautiful Garbage", which has sold 385,000 to date.

Faith Evans' "The First Lady" (Capitol) drops 2-5 on a 60% decline to 63,000 units, while the 18th installment of the "NOW That's What I Call Music!" series dips 4-6 on a 20% fall to 61,000 and Beck's "Guero" (Interscope) slides 3-7 on a 28% drop to 58,000 copies. In its 30th week in the top 10, Green Day's "American Idiot" (Reprise) falls 7-8 on a 3% dip to 57,000. Gwen Stefani's "Love, Angel, Music, Baby" (Interscope) re-enters the top tier with a 15-9 move on an 18% boost to sales of 56,600 copies. The Killers' "Hot Fuss" (Island) also rebounds, moving 11-10 on a 2% gain to 55,000.

Video of the year honors at last week's CMT Music Awards for "Days Go By", and a performance the song on NBC's "Today" prompted a 67% sales surge to 25,000 copies for Keith Urban's "Be Here". The Capitol Nashville set climbs 59-27. But making the chart's most notable move is Slipknot's "Vol. 3: (The Subliminal Verses)" (Roadrunner/IDJMG). The chart's greatest sales gainer rockets 151-29 on a 261% increase to 24,000 copies thanks to the release of a special edition that features eight new bonus tracks.

Overall U.S. album sales were up about 1% over the previous week at 9.8 million units, but down about 25.5% from the same week in 2004. Sales for 2005 are about 10% lower than 2004 at 165 million units.

(Billboard)



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