August 31, 2011 Chart News: Pistol Annies Make Country Music History

As for how the rest of the SoundScan Top 200 Current Albums chart fared, it’s another strong week for country music and below is what we learned, followed – as usual – by the charts!

• 36% of the Top 30 albums this week on SoundScan’s Top 200 Current charts are country albums with 32% of the Top 100 also belonging to country artists (and this doesn’t include country-related artists like Mumford and Sons and The Civil Wars).
• Pistol Annies sold 41,980 copies of Hell On Heels.
• The last two week’s #1 country album, Tailgates & Tanlines from Luke Bryan sold another 35,000 albums this week.
• My Kinda Party remains in the Top 5 best-selling country albums as Jason Aldean releases “Tattoos On This Town” to country radio.
• Chief  from Eric Church is also Top 5 while “Drink In My Hand” becomes his the fastest rising single of his career as an already Top 40 single.
• Eli Young Band’s Life At Best rounds out the Top 5 and has now sold nearly 52,000 albums in two weeks.
• Sunny Sweeney had the seventh-best selling country album of the week to debut with over 14,500 fans taking home a copy of Concrete.
• With The Band Perry sitting at #9 on the Top 10 list of country albums, they join Sweeney and Eli Young Band to give Republic Nashville Records 3 albums in the Top 10.
• Taylor Swift is at #10 with Speak Now  and she’s officially has the #1 selling country album released in 2010 as it passes Need You Now from Lady Antebellum.
• Big Machine Label Group has 4 of the top 10 albums in country music.
• Brad Paisley is only 53,000 copies away from scanning Gold with This IS Country Music. The current single “Remind Me” is the third #1 single from the album
•  Chris Young’s Neon rounds out the Top 15 and has now sold over 161,000 copies.
• The Original Motion Picture Sountrack for Country Strong has sold over 332,000 copies now and took a remarkable jump up the charts with a 94% sales increase thanks to national pay cable exposure.
• Jeff Bridges has sold nearly 20,000 copies of his self-titled album which was produced by Crazy Heart soundtrack producer T-Bone Burnett.
• Rascal Flatts’ Nothing Like This has now sold 953,000 copies.
• Sara Evans Stronger has sold nearly 275,000 copies.

Jake Owen’s Barefoot Blue Jean Night should end up being one of the best-selling albums of the week being held back only by the new Lil Wayne and Red Hot Chili Peppers from the Top 200 albums #1 slot.