Norah Jones Makes It Six
Norah Jones continues to be untouchable at Number One, as her second album, Feels Like Home, sold another 147,000 copies, according to Nielsen SoundScan, to spend its sixth straight week on top of the charts. Though Jones faces some strong competition on next week’s chart — Usher, the Vines and N.E.R.D. all released new records this week — Home‘s reign on top is the longest such stay since Eminem’s The Marshall Mathers LP spent its first eight weeks at Number One in the summer of 2000.
As has often been the case during Home‘s reign, there wasn’t much in the way of competition. Split Personality, the debut album by rapper Cassidy, continues J Records’ winning ways, selling 118,000 at Number Two. Evanescence’s Fallen has never spent a week higher than Number Two, but the record continues to register six-figure sales, moving 105,000 at Number Three. Jessica Simpson’s reissued In This Skin was the other six-figure seller, with a tally of 103,000 at Number Four. Rounding out the Top Five was Godsmack’s acoustic Other Side, which sold 98,000, a huge drop from the group’s previous release, last year’s Faceless, which debuted Number One with sales of 267,000.
Recent Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Jackson Browne earned the third highest debut with The Very Best of Jackson Browne, which sold 24,000 at Number Forty-six. Another collection, Ultimate Hall and Oates was the only other newcomer to the Top 100, selling 19,000 copies at Number Sixty-three.
The singles chart tends to perk up around the time of American Idol, and after weeks of singles earning Number Ones with sales under 10,000, Idol vet Clay Aiken stomped all over the chart with “The Way/Solitaire,” which sold a whopping 100,000 copies in its debut week.
This week’s Top Ten albums: Norah Jones’ Feels Like Home; Cassidy’s Split Personality; Evanescence’s Fallen; Jessica Simpson’s In This Skin; Godsmack’s Other Side; Kanye West’s College Drop Out; Kenny Chesney’s When the Sun Goes Down; Bad Boy’s 10th Anniversary compilation; Maroon 5’s Songs About Jane; Josh Groban’s Closer.