The Kids Dominate the Charts
Toddlers and tweens stormed the album chart this week, with kid-centric offerings selling enough CDs to take the top three spots. The soundtrack to the Disney Channel movie High School Musical took Number One, selling another 101,000 copies, according to Nielsen SoundScan; while the ninth installment of the Kidz Bop series — in which children sing pop hits like Mariah Carey’s “We Belong Together” and Green Day’s “Wake Me Up When September Ends” — moved 98,000 CDs to bow at Number Two. And surfer-folkie Jack Johnson’s soundtrack to the children’s film Curious George, Sing-A-Longs and Lullabies, dropped only one spot, to Number Three (89,000).
Meanwhile, last week’s chart-topper, R&B crooner Jaheim’s third release, Ghetto Classics, fell to Number Ten, with 59,000 copies sold. The CD marked the third Top Ten album and first Number One for the New Jersey singer. R&B diva Mary J. Blige’s former Number One The Breakthrough, stood firmly at Number Four (76,000) this week, while British singer-songwriter James Blunt saw his debut, Back to Bedlam, climb three places, to Number Five (87,000).
Adult contemporary singer Barry Manilow’s The Greatest Songs of the Fifties, his second chart-topper in his three-decade career, dropped to Number Six (66,000), and opera tenor Andrea Bocelli’s release Amore slid down two spots to Number Seven (65,000). Rounding out the Top Ten are superstar rapper Eminem’s hits collection, Curtain Call, climbing two spots to Number Eight (63,000), and American Idol Carrie Underwood’s debut, Some Hearts, down two places to Number Nine (61,000). Actor-turned-R&B-star Jamie Foxx saw his former Number One, Unpredictable, drop out of the Top Ten for the first time to Number Twelve, with 46,000 copies sold.
After Kidz Bop 9, the week’s second-highest debut belongs to the Arctic Monkeys. But after breaking British sales records, the buzz band’s ultra-hyped debut, Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not, sold a modest 34,000 copies on these shores to land at Number Twenty-Four.
Next week, watch to see how R&B prodigy Ne-Yo fares against the Top Ten vets with his debut In My Own Words. The album’s autobiographical “So Sick” is currently Number Eight on the Billboard Hot 100. Dayton, Ohio, screamers Hawthorne Heights will also try to shake things up with their second effort, If Only You Were Lonely, the follow-up to the band’s 2004 gold debut The Silence in Black and White. And don’t discount the American Bad Ass himself, Kid Rock, who will enter the pack with his first live album, Live Trucker.
This week’s Top Ten: High School Musical: The Original Soundtrack; Kidz Bop 9; Jack Johnson and Friends’ Sing-A-Longs and Lullabies for the Film “Curious George”; Mary J. Blige’s The Breakthrough; James Blunt’s Back to Bedlam; Barry Manilow’s The Greatest Songs of the Fifties; Andrea Bocelli’s Amore; Eminem’s Curtain Call; Carrie Underwood’s Some Hearts; Jaheim’s Ghetto Classics.