Hazel's Blog World: Lady Gaga's Born This Way Holds On To #1 Billboard Spot

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Lady Gaga's Born This Way Holds On To #1 Billboard Spot

BTW sales drop 84 percent, while Death Cab for Cutie debut at #3 with Codes and Keys.
By Gil Kaufman

Lady Gaga
Photo: Credit KCSPresse / Splash News

What a difference a week — and a price higher than 99 cents — makes. While Lady Gaga will hold on to the #1 spot on the Billboard 200 albums chart this week, sales for Born This Way were down a whopping 84 percent in its second go-round, according to figures provided by Nielsen SoundScan, plummeting from more than 1.1 million to just over 174,000. That put Mother Monster within sight of the 1.3 million mark, while the unstoppable Adele held the #2 spot with 21, which moved another 121,000 to push over the 2 million mark.

There are plenty of other new faces in the top 10, with Death Cab for Cutie crashing in at #3 with Codes and Keys (102,000), Eddie Vedder just behind with his sedate solo effort Ukulele Songs (71,000) and Kentucky rockers My Morning Jacket notching their highest debut yet at #5 with Circuital (55,000). The other newbie in the mix is Flogging Molly's Speed of Darkness, which lands at #9 thanks to sales of 25,000.

The rest of the top 10: Brad Paisley's This Is Country Music (#6, 53,000), NOW 38 (#7, 39,000), Jason Aldean's My Kinda Party (#8, 33,000) and "Glee": The Music, Volume 6 (#10, 25,000).

A number of hyped albums suffer double-digit dips including the self-titled boy band supergroup's NKOTBSB (down 15 spots and 63 percent, #22), the Beastie Boys' Hot Sauce Committee Part 2 (down 12 spots and 29 percent) and Lonely Island's Turtleneck & Chain (down 14 spots and 30 percent).

Gaga couldn't knock Adele off the top of the iTunes singles and albums charts, with 21 holding the top spot above Born This Way, followed by Death Cab, Vedder, My Morning Jacket, Paisley, Mumford & Sons' Sigh No More, "American Idol" champ Scotty McCreery's season 10 digital highlights album, buzz band Foster the People's Torches and Flogging Molly.

While Gaga has already released a blizzard of singles to date, Adele's first, and so far only, single, "Rolling in the Deep," continues to sit atop the iTunes singles tally, holding off Pitbull's "Give Me Everything," Gaga's "The Edge of Glory," LMFAO's "Party Rock Anthem" and Lil Wayne's "How to Love." Another Young Money member, Nicki Minaj, is in the #6 slot with "Super Bass," outpacing Bruno Mars' "The Lazy Song," DJ Khaled's "I'm the One," Jennifer Lopez's "On the Floor" and Lupe Fiasco's "The Show Goes On."

Things are likely to stay static at the top next week as the major new releases include albums from Britain's Arctic Monkeys, country singer Ronnie Dunn and underground rapper Tech N9ne.

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