Mary J. Blige has ended Josh Groban’s Christmas-fueled reign at Billboard’s top spot by selling 204,000 copies of Growing Pains. But! More »
Okay, maybe the holiday retail season wasn’t that bad. But while even those who’ve wandered here this morning looking for pictures of t.A.T.u.’s baby won’t be surprised that music retail experienced a drop in sales from this time last year, the steepness of said drop between 2006 and 2007 is kinda sorta pretty depressing even for us jaded industry rubberneckers “observers.”
Because that’s when his holiday album Noel‘s ride on the top of the charts will end. But he shouldn’t feel too bad: It sold 669,000 (!) copies last week, raising its year-to-date sales total to 2.77 million and giving him the prize of the highest-selling album of 2007. The High School Musical 2 soundtrack is second–and only 70,000 albums behind–so the last week of the year, which will probably be light on the Christmas-album-buying tip, will likely be crucial as far as how this battle plays out. Look, it’s actually something exciting on the pop charts! Who’d have thought!
What can Oprah, a holiday hook, a lackluster year for album sales, and a pair of oh-so-pinchable cheeks get you? In the case of Josh Groban, the answer could be the No. 1 record of the year, at least according to SoundScan. Groban’s O-approved Christmas album Noel has sold 2.1 million copies since coming out in October, and with the way it’s been gaining in sales over the past few weeks, it will likely pass the current year-to-date leader–the High School Musical 2 soundtrack, which has sold 2.5 million copies to date–and it may even hit the unattainable-this-year 3 million sold mark.
Yes, that’s right: It’s another week in December where the album charts are topped by Josh Groban’s Oprah-endorsed Noel. This week, the holiday-themed collection sold 581,000 copies, an 8% gain over last week’s sales total and more than double the tally of the week’s No. 2 record, Alicia Keys’ As I Am. (Which sold a not-shabby 234,000 copies itself.)
Josh Groban’s Christmas album, Noel, was doubly blessed last week, thanks to inclusion in Oprah’s “Favorite Things” list and the opening of the holiday-shopping season on Friday. Thanks to those two events, Noel‘s sales rose 81%, and its 405,000-copy sales total was enough for the album to wrest the No. 1 spot from last week’s top seller, Alicia Keys’ As I Am.
Welcome to On The Shelf, Idolator’s weekly look at the coming torrent of record releases. Looking over the roster of albums being released tomorrow, we realized one thing: next week’s chart may be another one in which the all-important mom demographic rules the roost. After the jump, we look at tomorrow’s offerings from Josh Groban, Keith Urban, and Mickey Avalon, as well as two compilations of recent pop hits.
