Album Sales Remain Steady This Week

Kenny Chesney leads the 5-10 section on the SoundScan Chart this week with Hemingway’s Whiskey, an album which joined the Zac Brown Band and Lady Antebellum as an ACM Album of the Year nominee.  Rascal Flatts’ Nothing Like This is next at #7 while The Band Perry rides an 18% sales boost of their self-titled album to score the #8 slot this week.  Steel magnolia is next with their three-week old self-titled effort sliding past the 50k mark while Sugarland rounds out the Country Albums Top 10 with Incredible Machine, an album which too was certified platinum recently. 

Tim McGraw’s Number One Hits, a two-disc collection of his #1 hits on the Billboard chart , sits at #11 on the SoundScan Country Albums chart this week with sales about two weeks away from 250,000 copies sold, which means that he’s gotten yet another Gold plaque to add his repoitore.  In fact, only Greatest Hits, Volume 3 and Tim’s very first Curb album from 1992 are his only albums to have yet to achieved this feat.  Another Greatest Hits project follows Tim on the chart this week as Joe Nichols’ career-spanning lean 10 song collection is the highest charting album on the chart this week with nearly 9,000 copies scanned.  Wanda Jackson’s The Party Ain’t Over is next with nearly 8,000 copies sold in it’s first week as well.  Miranda Lambert’s Revolution, which was nominated for an ACM Award this week.  Her Fiancee, Blake Shelton – who is co-hosting the ACMs with Reba – is right behind Miranda this week with Loaded: The Best of Blake Shelton. 

The final five albums of the Top 20 SoundScan Country Albums is lead-off by the Zac Brown Band’s Foundation, a record which has sold nearly 2.5 million copies while Billy Currington’s latest Enjoy Yourself sits right behind them with a strong 38% sales increase this week and has now sold nearly 230,000 copies.  Keith Urban’s Get Closer has now sold Gold and feels like it’s on its way to Platinum.  Alan Jackson’s 34 Number Ones is close to following Tim McGraw’s hit collection to Gold status while Darius Rucker’s sophomore country album Charleston, SC 1966 rounds out the Top 20 this week.

The interesting albums section starts with Eric Church’s Carolina.  It has now sold 386,000 copies as “Smoke A Little Smoke” runs up the Top 20.  Jerrod Niemann’s Judge Jerrod and the Hung Jury sits next with nearly 230,000 copies sold while Carrie Underwood’s Play On is inching closer to double platinum as word came down that she not only won’t be releasing a fifth single from the record but she was ‘snubbed’ from getting an ACM Award nomination for Entertainer of the Year this year, particularly when she won the last two years in a row.  Chris Young’s Man I Want To Be has now sold 410,000 plus copies with “Voices” moving closer and closer to giving the vocalist three #1 singles from his break-through record for RCA.  Rounding out our rundown is the debut of Lori McKenna’s fine new album Lorraine. 

Next week we’ll see where the JaneDear girls land on the chart and in two weeks we’ll see how Thompson Square fares.  As always, check back here every Wednesday to find out!