Fan Fare
TLC are still busy answering their fan mail. The R&B trio’s new
album remains the country’s bestseller for the second straight
week. According to SoundScan, Fanmail sold 226,000 copies
for the week ending March 7. That put TLC comfortably ahead of
hip-hop queen Lauyrn Hill, who was still basking in her Grammy-grab
from two weeks back. Her award-winning album actually moved up from
No. 3 to No. 2.
Meanwhile, country bedrock George Strait, who’s released more than
twodozen album in eighteen years, added to his long list of Top Ten
hits. His latest, Always Never the Same, debuted at No. 6
last week.
Hill wasn’t the only Grammy winner who saw sales jump following
national exposure on the Grammys. Pre-Grammys, Sheryl Crow’s
Globe Sessions was at No. 71. Post-Grammys, it climbed
back up to No. 46. Likewise, Madonna’s Ray of Light,
recently down at No. 60, came in at No. 49.
But the two clear winners were Shania Twain and Latin star Ricky
Martin. Twain, who was reportedly peeved backstage for not winning
Best Country Album, is having the last laugh as Come On
Over climbed to No. 5, with weekly sales up 42 percent.
Martin, a former member of Menudo who took advantage of his network
tube time with a much-talked about performance, also continued
tosell well. His album Vuelve, which was selling less than
4,000 copies a week right before the Grammy’s, sold 18,000 copies
last week and came in at No. 79.
From the top, it was TLC’s Fanmail, followed by Lauryn
Hill’s The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill(selling 201,000);
Eminem’s The Slim Shady LP (198,000); Britney Spears’
…Baby One More Time(178,000); Twain’s Come On
Over (154,000); Strait’s Always Never the Same
(122,000);Cher’s Believe (113,000); the Dixie Chicks’
Wide Open Spaces (109,000); the Offspring’s
Americana (95,000); and the Roots’ Things Fall
Apart (82,000).