SoundScanner: Lady Gaga's 'ARTPOP' Sinks Like A Deflated Koons Balloon
Eminem has plenty to be thankful for this week; the Detroit rapper rules Nielsen SoundScan's singles and albums chart this week, as Lady Gaga watches sales of her Artpop plummet. For more, we turn to this week's SoundScanner:
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Eminem rises, Gaga falls: Eminem returns to No. 1 on SoundScan's Top Current Albums chart this week with The Marshall Mathers LP 2, which sold 120,000 copies its third week in stores. That brings its total sales to 1.124 million. (Em also controls SoundScan's Digital Songs chart with "The Monster," his duet with Rihanna, which sold 241,000 downloads this week.) Meanwhile, last week's No. 1, Lady Gaga's Artpop, sinks like a deflated Jeff Koons ballon, falling to No. 8 on a disastrous 82 percent sales slide. That's worse than the second week drop off of both Kanye West's Yeezus and Justin Timberlake's The 20/20 Experience, Pt. 2 of 2, both of which fell around 80 percent their second week. Artpop has sold a less-than-blockbuster 305,000 copies in two weeks.
Five Finger Death Punch, ‘Hunger Games' debut strong: Los Angeles metal dudes Five Finger Death Punch arrive at No. 2 on this week's chart with The Wrong Side of Heaven and the Righteous Side of Hell, Part 2, which sold 77,000 copies this week. The album is the follow up to July's Volume 1, which sold 112,000 copies in its arrival (also good for a No. 2 debut) and has sold 291,000 copies to date. The soundtrack to The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, which features songs by Coldplay, the National, Lorde and more, debuts at No. 5, a far more modest debut than last year's soundtrack to the first film, which started at No. 1 with 175,000 sales. This week's other Top 10 debuts come from American Idol alum Daughtry (No. 6, 55,000), Memphis rapper Yo Gotti (No. 7, 47,000) and the compilation album Cities 97 Sampler, Live from Studio C: Vol. 25 (No. 10, 40,000), a regional album that raised money for Minneapolis-area charities.
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‘Bound 2' climbs chart: The video for Kanye West's "Bound 2" left a lot of people scratching their heads, but it also helped drive digital sales of his Yeezus track. The song, which features a vocal assist by Charlie Wilson and samples of Ponderosa Twins Plus One and Brenda Lee, jumped up to No. 84 on this week's Digital Songs chart, up 713 percent from the week before, when it didn't chart. It also helped bump sales of Yeezus, which charts at No. 110 this week, up 42 spots from last week on a 44 percent sales boost. Next week, we'll see if James Franco and Seth Rogen's "Bound 2" spoof video – or any of Kanye's headline-making interviews – moved the needle in any way.
Katy, Miley go gold: Katy Perry's Prism and Miley Cyrus' Bangerz, two of the biggest pop releases of the fall, both cross the 500,000 sales mark this week. Perry's Prism, No. 11 this week, sold 39,000 copies, bringing its five week sales total to 524,000. Bangerz, released two weeks before Prism, is No. 16 this week, and its 24,000 sales bring its cume to 502,000. The race to platinum is on, but will either one ever get there? Looks doubtful at this point.
Daft Punk still making ‘Memories': Daft Punk's Random Access Memories had one of the biggest lead-up campaigns in memory, with a months-long promotional rollout culminating in the May release of the album. The set has now been out for half a year, and continues to clip along: This week the album is at No. 141 with 3,000 sales, bringing its total sales to 830,000. The album bowed at No. 1 in May, selling 339,000 copies its first week. Since its release, the robot duo has made only a few promotional appearances, and has yet to play any live dates behind the album. Should they decide to perform in 2014 – hope, hope – they may find themselves with their first platinum album.