WWF Challenges Britney Spears
Let’s get ready to rummmmmble!
Red-hot professional wrestling dominates cable TV ratings, cashes
in on home video sales and sells out arenas across the country, so
why shouldn’t it crash the music charts? That’s what the World
Wrestling Federation, home to the Rock, the Undertaker, and, of
course, Stone Cold Steve Austin, has done with its
latest release, WWF The Music: Volume 3. The album, which
consists of heavy metal anthems for its stars, jumped from No. 18
to No. 10 for the week ending Feb. 21, according to SoundScan. No
doubt boosting sales was the recent WWF pay-per-view match during
which the album was heavily promoted.
Still, to grab the championship belt the WWF must get past teen
star Britney Spears, whose debut album, …
Baby One More Time, remains the nation’s No. 1 album, where
it’s stood its ground for four of the six weeks it’s been in
stores.
Overall, record store action was sleepy last week, with only one
new record debuting in the top 150 (Mr. Serv-On‘s
Da Next Level), but that should change soon. After a slow
month, some new big-name releases are finally hitting stores
shelves, led by R&B divas TLC (Fan
Mail) and hip-hop’s the Roots (Things
Fall Apart). Both are bound to enter next week’s chart with
strong numbers. And new rock albums by critical darlings
Sleater-Kinney (Hot Rock) and former
Replacements frontman Paul
Westerberg (Suicaine Gratifaction) should draw
consumers into stores. Not to mention that this week’s Grammy
telecast is bound to boost sales for the annual winners.
From the top, it was Spears’ … Baby One More Time
(selling 198,000 copies), followed by Lauryn
Hill‘s The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill (122,000);
the Offspring‘s Americana (115,000); the
Dixie Chicks‘ Wide Open Spaces (97,000);
‘N Sync (94,000); 2Pac‘s Greatest
Hits (87,000); Cher‘s Believe
(86,000); DMX‘s Flesh of My Flesh Blood of My
Blood (83,000); Everlast‘s Whitey Ford
Sings the Blues (81,000); and WWF: The Music Vol.
3.