The “Grammy Family” may be gearing up for a chart takeover, with Kanye West and Common coming soon, and John Legend’s Evolver being a Top 3 debut.T.I. traveled from that #3 spot to #7, a strong fall for the Atlanta rapper, whose now eclipsed the platinum, million mark with his Paper Trail.
Ne-Yo’s Year of the Gentleman continues to be a better showing than any rap release for the Def Jam label. Lil Wayne stayed in his mid-twenties zone of recent, selling Tha Carter III, strongly towards three million. Young Jeezy remains strong with his Recession, again staying a few notches above LAX.
Top 200 Album Sales (Top 5 Hip Hop/R&B)
Rank Artist Album This Week Est. Total
4 John Legend Evolver 132,823—133,094
7 T.I. Paper Trail 76,560—1,047,627
15 Ne-Yo Year of the Gentleman 26,574—548,027
20 Lil Wayne Tha Carter III 23,037—2,624,722
28 Young Jeezy Recession 17,412—578,973
The Game and LAX fell out of the Top 30 for the first time, still in a crowded pack with another potential chance at Top 25. Nelly was over 10,000 units behind with Brass Knuckles, an area not occupied by any rap release.
DJ Khaled cracked the six-figure mark with his We Global. However, for independent artists, few were more shocking than Joe Budden, returning to the Top 200 for the first time in five years, with his digital album Halfway House, selling over 3,000 paid downloads.
As Nas and Devin The Dude left the Top 200, Ice Cube held the bottom spot with his Raw Footage, an impressive independent effort, still over 300,000 units short of his 2006 effort, Laugh Now, Cry Later.
Other Notables
Rank Artist Album This Week Est. Total
35 The Game LAX 14,121—545,974
112 Nelly Brass Knuckles 4,738—157,063
126 DJ Khaled We Global 3,535—101,046
183 Joe Budden Halfway House 3,174—3,174
185 Ice Cube Raw Footage 3,093—164,191
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