ChartWatch for February 10, 2009It’s
the week after The Grammy’s (a.k.a Taylor Swift’s prom) so expect a couple of
sales jumps as the people that live in caves flip on their TV’s and say “Hey, I
like the Black Eyed Peas. I’m gonna buy
their new album.” (If you’re new here,
know this one thing…I don’t like the Black Eyed Peas.) It’s also a few days after the New Orleans
Saints became Super Bowl champs (Who Dat?!) and few days before the All Star
game & Valentine’s day. In other
words, people have a few things to celebrate.
I’ve been feeling pretty good…and then it happened. The numbers came in.After over a year longs
worth of delays, an early accidental release by Amazon, heavy bootlegging, and
an almost universal thumbs down from various critics, Lil Wayne’s Rebirth hit
stores last week and managed to sell…wait for it…no, that can’t be right…really?….that
much?….173,821 copies. That’s right,
Lil Wayne’s “rock” album sold 173,821.
The New Orleans MC managed to grab the number two spot this week which,
coupled with his jail term delay, is some pretty good news for CashMoney
records. I, for one, never (ever, ever, ever) expected a Lil Wayne
rock album to come out let alone sell somewhat decently. I’m cool with Wayne the rapper, but as
someone that actually listens to rock music, I never thought…well
nevermind. So be honest with me…ya’ll
really like the album? Really? Now, even though I’m hating, this album has
managed to sell against all odds so I can congratulate Wayne and CashMoney on
their business sense. But their music
sense…ummmmm……moving on.
Like
I said earlier expect a few sales jumps.
The Black Eyed Peas move up from the 10 spot to number five by selling
70,000 copies of their Hip-Pop album The
E.N.D. At this point I am convinced
that everyone in America has this album.
Jay-Z
also takes a bump, moving up 10 places to the 27 spot and selling 20,306
copies of his latest album, The Blueprint
3
. He is followed by CashMoney’s, We Are Young Money, which sells another19,956 copies and takes the number twenty eight spot.
Eminem
holds the 30 first spot, selling 19,031 copies of Relapse. Hey Em, I know it’s
a short turn-around but we’re waiting on that Relapse 2 so get that out. Last
up we have Gucci Mane whose latest album, The
State vs. Radric Davis
sells 13,848 copies and grabs the number 45spotI’m late on this but if
you get a chance check out Wendy Day’s AllHipHop article about 360 deals. It’s an interesting read for those of you
that like to look at the charts and album sales (along with those that plan on
entering this industry. Word of advice. Sadly, If you want to make it big as a rapper
in today’s music industry you need to get a guitar, an autotune machine, and a
Fergie).
Dropping This Week
The
first artist on “dropping” has spit one of (in my opinion) the greatest verses
in Hip Hop. As a matter of fact when
this site put up a list of the “20 Dopest Verses Ever” I went combing through
the page to make sure it was there.
Canibus’ closing bars on the Lost Boyz – Love, Peace, and Happiness made me break the rewind button on my
tape player. As a matter of fact it’s
probably the only song I remember off of that album. Now, since that time Canibus’ career has
been, for lack of a better word, unfulfilled.
Since dropping his debut album the MC has dissed LL Cool J (he lost…I
still think he won but the world says he lost), thrown barbs at Eminem (ignored
for the most part but there’s more on that later), became part of the rap
supergroup, The HRSMN, (still waiting on that album) and enlisted in the
military to “get away from music.” Since
1998 Canibus has managed to release eight solo discs and a couple of
compilation albums which have all mostly received mixed reviews. Now the Jamacian MC returns two years after
his last album, For Whom The Bell Tolls,
to release Melatonin Magik. The main news that’s coming out about this
latest disc is that Canibus has another diss song for Marshall Mathers. So just like Eminem continues to diss Mariah
Carey and no one cares, Canibus continues to diss Eminem…and no one cares. Hopefully this album, like his most recent
offerings, will fare better in the eyes of fans and critics.
Next
up is DJ Kay Slay with his latest compilation More Than Just A DJ. Now we
all know that the DJ album is just a collection of the best people the DJ can
find. The more connected the DJ the more
high profile the artists. Here the Drama
King takes time out of slapping your favorite DJ to get a few Hip Hop notables
(and not so notables) together. The
album features Busta Rhymes,
Tony Yayo, Papoose, Lloyd Banks, Jim Jones, Rell, Jacki-O, Remy Ma,
Hedonis, Ayanna Irish, (pause to take breath) Yo Gotti,
Cam’ron, Vado,
Papoose, Dorrough, Young Chris and Jay Rock. People, those are just the featured artist on
the first six songs of a 20 song
album. Kay Slay is not playing
around. Google the album if you want to
see the rest because that’s a lot of artists.
Kay Slay. More Than Just A DJ. Pick it
up.
Last
up is Kansas City’s The Deep Thinkers with their fourth full length album Make It Quake. The duo is composed of MC Aaron Sutton and DJ
Kyle D####. This is a group that focuses
on a variety of social issues with a backdrop of 70’s soul samples. If you want to know more about the group then
check out their innate sounds website, or go out there and pick up the new
album. Plus it’s got one of those nice
looking album covers that I like.
That’s
it for “Dropping” so see you next week.