“Don’t Forget The Lyrics” Flexes Its Soundscan Muscle

The top tier of this week’s album chart was pretty grim, thanks to a post-Grammy hangover that resulted in people promptly forgetting that they could easily buy albums by the likes of Jack Johnson (No. 1, off 42%), Alicia Keys (No. 2, off 51%) and Amy Winehouse (No. 3, off 55%). But lurking in its middle reaches was yet another testament to the power of televised music: Boyz II Men’s Motown: A Journey Through Hitsville USA shot up from No. 182 to No. 62 on a 157-percent sales gain, one derived in large part from the group’s appearance Thursday night on the Fox game show Don’t Forget The Lyrics, which featured them performing songs from the new album. Oh, if only music programming wasn’t such a ratings disaster, the music industry would be able to fix itself but good!

Biggest Debuts: The latest installment in the Kidz Bop series–Kidz Bop 13, which has covers of the Shop Boyz, Fergie, and Colbie Caillat, among others–entered the chart at No. 4, selling 49,000 copies. Coming in at No. 8 and selling 37,000 copies was Chris Cagle’s My Life’s Been A Country Song, and entering the chart at No. 19 was Jim Jones’ Harlem’s American Gangster, which sold 25,000 copies.

Notable Jumps: Another interesting gainer lurking in the lower reaches of this week’s charts: the soundtrack for Once, which was honored with an Oscar on Sunday night and which actually dropped 2% in overall sales. But contrast that dip with the album’s 82% gain on the digital-sales chart; its week-to-week digital sales went up by about 5,000 copies, while “Falling Slowly,” the track that won Oscar gold, also made a reappearance on the digital-tracks chart at No. 103, selling 14,000 copies and shooting up 359%.

Given that two weeks ago, Herbie Hancock and Amy Winehouse experienced impressive digital gains in the few hours after the Grammys–which were followed by both albums shooting up the big chart thanks to people reaching their brick-and-mortar stores during the week–one could think that the digital-sales chart of the week immediately following a Sunday-night awards ceremony now serves as a sort of leading indicator for sales leaps on the big chart in the week after.

Dropping Off: Let’s just say that it was another bad week for the record business, with overall sales dropping 18.5% week-to-week and off 13.1% from this week last year.

Nickelback Award For Inexplicable Durability: That Sara Bareilles–what a cutie! Well, to people who aren’t me; they’re still buying her album Little Voice in relative droves, and she was the only member of the top 20 to experience a sales increase this week. (She’s up 9% to 37,000 sold; that tally propelled her from No. 21 to No. 7.)

The top 20, with sales totals in parentheses: 1. Jack Johnson, Sleep Through The Static (105,000) 2. Alicia Keys, As I Am (53,000) 3. Amy Winehouse, Back To Black (52,000) 4. Kidz Bop 13 (49,000) 5. Step Up 2: The Streets soundtrack (43,000) 6. Juno Soundtrack (38,000) 7. Sara Bareilles, Little Voice (37,000) 8. Chris Cagle, My Life’s Been A Country Song (37,000) 9. Mary J. Blige, Growing Pains (35,000) 10. Taylor Swift (33,000) 11. Sheryl Crow, Detours (33,000) 12. Keyshia Cole, Just Like You (30,000) 13. Chris Brown, Exclusive (29,000) 14. Hannah Montana 2: Meet Miley Cyrus (29,000) 15. Alvin & The Chipmunks soundtrack (26,000) 16. Herbie Hancock, River: The Joni Letters (26,000) 17. 2008 Grammy Nominees (25,000) 18. Daughtry 25,000) 19. Jim Jones, Harlem’s American Gangster (25,000) 20. Across The Universe soundtrack (deluxe edition) (23,000)