Norah Jones Reclaims Billboard #1 from Fall Out Boy

Last week, Fall Out Boy’s Infinity on High usurped Norah Jones’ Not Too Late
– the previous week’s #1 – as the nation’s top-selling LP, relegating
the jazzy songstress to the chart’s #2 position and scoring the Chicago rockers the first chart-crowning debut of their careers. This week, Jones returned the favor.
With nearly 211,000 copies of Not Too Late sold during the album’s third week of release, Jones reclaims Billboard‘s coveted throne, leaving Fall Out Boy in the proverbial dust. Sales of Infinity on High
dipped by more than 50 percent, dropping FOB to the chart’s #5 slot
with second-week sales reported at close to 119,000, according to the
latest SoundScan results.
But the bigger news is the windfall from the 2007 Grammy Awards, handed
out early last week. Whether you took home a statuette or not didn’t
matter much to consumers – even albums by nominees who didn’t win
experienced major sales boons.
The biggest spike in retail interest came for the Dixie Chicks, whose Taking the Long Way was honored with five Grammys, including Record of the Year, Album of the Year and Song of the Year prizes.
Sales of the LP rose a whopping 714 percent to top 103,000, landing the
Chicks in the chart’s #8 slot; during the previous week, Taking the Long Way sold nearly 13,000 units, and occupied the chart’s #72 position.
Likewise, nominee Corinne Bailey Rae’s self-titled album experienced a
132 percent sales surge, scanning another 120,000 copies – enough to
help the disc hop four places on the chart to #4. Even the 2007 Grammy Nominees
compilation – featuring 23 tracks from this year’s contenders – enjoyed
a 116 percent increase in sales, climbing from #7 to #3 on the chart
with more than 131,000 copies sold.
Sales of FutureSex/LoveSounds
by Justin Timberlake – who walked off with the Best Dance Recording and
Best Rap/Sung Collaboration awards – soared 123 percent for a total of
108,000, earning JT the chart’s #7 spot. John Mayer’s Continuum,
winner of the Best Pop Vocal Album, was the beneficiary of a 182
percent sales jump, ending the week with more than 80,000 scans and the
chart’s #10 opening – up from #29 the week before. Best Rock Album
honoree, the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Stadium Arcadium, climbs to #12 this week from #39, selling 67,000 units – thanks to a sales increase of 194 percent. Big winner Mary J. Blige’s The Breakthrough sold more than 43,000 – a 161 percent sales spike – and ends up at #21, climbing more than 30 chart positions.
Gnarls Barkley’s Best Alternative Album-winning St. Elsewhere soared 192 percent to finish at #44 – up from #111 – with 27,000 scans, and James Blunt’s Back to Bedlam experienced a 152 percent increase in sales, closing out the week at #47 with sales of 23,000.
Elsewhere on the chart, Robin Thicke’s The Evolution of Robin Thicke
continues selling like hotcakes, holding at #6 this week with around
116,000 units scanned; sales of the disc jumped 90 percent. And ending
the week at #9 – down six spots from #3 but still up 34 percent in
sales – is Daughtry, the self-titled debut from “American Idol” finalist Chris Daughtry’s rock act, with 102,000 copies sold.
When it comes to new releases, a mere four pop up on this week’s chart, including the late Gerald Levert’s In My Songs. The first posthumous release from the singer, who died in November at age 40, In My Songs is Levert’s highest-charting debut, opening at #2 with 165,000 copies sold. Further down the chart is Lucinda Williams’ West, bowing at #14 with 57,000 scans, while Van Morrison’s Van Morrison at the Movies
follows at #35 with week-one sales of 29,000-plus. And finally,
debuting at #84 with 13,000 sold, is the latest solo mixtape by the
Dipset’s JR Writer, JR Writer: Writer’s Block 4; the album was largely produced by the Diplomats’ Dukedagod.