SoundScanner: Black Sabbath Earn Their First #1 Album
Raise those devil horns in the air because Black Sabbath scores their first No. 1 album this week, while their old friend Robin Thicke continues to rule the singles chart with his addictive "Blurred Lines." Here’s a look at this week’s Nielsen SoundScan sales charts:
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SABBATH LEADS DEBUTS: Black Sabbath – combined age of the three members: 192! – score their first No. 1 album this week with 13, the metal gods’ first album of new material with Ozzy Osbourne at the helm in 35 years. The album sold a healthy 155,000 copies its first week, marking the group’s strongest sales week in SoundScan history. The album is one of nine debuts in the Top 20, and is followed by Big Time Rush’s 24/Seven (No. 4, 35,000); Goo Goo Dolls’ Magnetic (No. 8, 29,000); the Man of Steel score (No. 9, 29,000); the Lonely Island’s Wack Album (No. 10, 28,000); Chrisette Michele’s Better (No. 12, 27,000); Boards of Canada’s Tomorrow’s Harvest (No. 13, 25,000); Jimmy Eat World’s Damage (No. 14, 24,000); and the Now That’s What I Call Country 6 compilation (No. 16, 23,000).
'LINES' GROWS: Robin Thicke’s Song of the Summer candidate "Blurred Lines" continues its three week run at the top of the Digital Songs chart this week, surging 18 percent from last week and selling 371,000 copies. That brings its total sales to 1.559 million, 334,000 copies ahead of its closest SOTS competitor, Daft Punk’s "Get Lucky." (Both songs feature Pharrell, so either way, it’s P’s summer.) "Blurred Lines" is a full 163,000 copies ahead of the week’s second place finisher, Imagine Dragons’ nearly year-old "Radioactive," which sold 208,000 copies this week. Meanwhile, Avril Lavigne’s "Here’s to Never Growing Up" jumps from No. 23 to No. 7 this week after a 72 percent sales boom. The song sold 131,000 copies this week, bringing its total to 711,000.
QUEENS FALL: Queens of the Stone Age take a royal tumble on the chart this week, falling from No. 1 to No. 15 with their latest album, …Like Clockwork. Sales of the album plummeted 74 percent its second week, from 91,000 copies last week to 24,000 copies during this week’s sales frame. That’s more than the 73 percent dip Daft Punk’s Random Access Memories suffered its second week, though the French robots were able to hold on to the chart’s top spot for two weeks. In terms of chart position, …Like Clockwork’s slide is worse than Paramore’s recent 1-11 fall, but not as bad as Chris Tomlin’s 1-21 fall back in February, which mark’s the year’s sharpest fall from grace.
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KANYE HELPS 'TIPSY': We won’t fully know the power of Kanye West until next week’s chart, when his latest album Yeezus hits the chart and is expected to debut at No. 1. But his influence is felt on the Digital Songs chart with the re-entry of St. Louis rapper J-Kwon’s 2004 hit "Tipsy," which sold 13,000 copies this week, a 457 percent rise over last week. What does Kanye have to do with this? ‘Ye simply mentioned "Tipsy" in an interview with the New York Times last week, calling it one of his favorites. Music buyers did the rest.
PUNK, BUBLÉ GO GOLD: Daft Punk made good on the gold accents in Guy Manuel’s helmet this week, as the French duo crossed the 500,000 sales marker with their four-week-old Random Access Memories. The album sold 48,000 copies this week, holding steady at No. 2 on the chart and bringing its total sales to 543,000 copies. The robots aren’t the only ones celebrating a gold sales plaque this week: Michael Bublé also crosses the half-million mark with his latest, To Be Loved. In its eighth week on the chart, the album landed at No. 25 and sold 17,000 copies, bringing its total sales to 506,000 copies. Now if only Buble would cover "Get Lucky" we could all get on with our lives.
[Photo: Getty Images]