Last week we contemplated the low sales for Ace Hood's Trials & Tribulations album. This week, we see a severe drop for Ace's album, at the same time we get a new entry with similarly low sales, Rich Gang. We all know those Young Money fans go hard for their rappers, however, it appears they didn't come out to purchase Birdman's YMCMB compilation (of sorts), Rich Gang. First off, the album was barely promoted or pushed at all-- it kind of just, dropped. Because of this, it's possible that people were simply unaware a Young Money/Cash Money compilation was even arriving-- on top of this, it wasn't even called anything related to YMCMB, it was called Rich Gang. Who is 'Rich Gang' exactly? Apparently all Birdman's friends. One YMCMB signee who does not seem to be apart of the Rich Gang crew is Drizzy Drake. His lack-of-appearance on the Rich Gang album was glaring, and this too could have had an affect on sales. Birdman says that Drake was too busy doing his own thing out of the country, which is obviously working for him. So thus Rich Gang was only able to pull 24,000 sales opening week. Did the album's quality reflect these numbers, or was this simply the result of shoddy promotion?
1) Jay Z— Magna Carta Holy Grail: Hov got pushed down this week to make room for Disney star Selena Gomez album, which nabbed the #1 spot. Thus we find Jay sitting at #2 this week, not without giving Selena competition—he sold 77,000 units of MCHG this past week, which is down 40%, but in comparison, Selena moved 97,000.
2) Rich Gang— Rich Gang: The Rich Gang album had basically no promo leading up to its release, although many singles were dropped and popped up on blogs prior to its drop. Nonetheless, it seems like those adoring YMCMB fans weren’t feeling it. Was it the lack of Drake? The album only moved 24,000 units during opening week, managing to debut within the top 10 at #9.
3) Justin Timberlake— The 20/20 Experience: Mr. Timberlake dropped one spot this week, with Rich Gang taking his #9 he fell to #10. The album sold another 21,000 units this past week, down only 14% in sales.
4) J. Cole— Born Sinner: This week J. Cole drops to #13, after being at #7 last week. The emcee has been faced with some strong mainstream competition, in the face of which, he’s already gone gold and is keeping a solid spot on the Billboard 200. This week Born Sinner pushed around 20, 591 units, dropping 22% in sales.
5) Macklemore & Ryan Lewis— The Heist: Macklemore and Ryan Lewis find themselves below J. Cole this week, still within the top 20 of the Billboard 200. At the #15 spot the duo sold around 17k, down only 9% in sales. They’ve been charting for a good 42 weeks now.
6) Wale— The Gifted: Will it be a quick drop off the charts for Wale? So far he’s been dropping more than a few spots each week. Last week he was at #15 and this week he dropped five more spots to #20. The rapper moved another 12,884 units of The Gifted.
7) Kanye West— Yeezus: Kanye West’s Yeezus definitely hasn’t been blowing up the charts like his Watch The Throne counterpart, Jay Z. The rapper is falling off from his #1 debut quite quickly. This week Yeezy dropped to #24 from last week’s #18, after only six weeks on the charts. Yeezus still moved around 11k, with a drop in sales of 25%.
8) Ace Hood— Trials & Tribulations: Ace Hood’s lackluster sales continue on his second week on the charts, and he also sees quite a plummet from his debut at #4. Ace dropped to #26 this week on the Billboard 200, under 10,000 units of Trials & Tribulations. That’s a 70% decrease in sales for the We The Best rapper.
In other news, Ciara is still within the top 50 with her self-titled album. She dropped to #31 this week from #20 last week. Mac Miller is further down the charts, with Watching Movies With The Sound Off coming in at #55, after six weeks of charting. Mac still moved around 6k this past week. Kendrick Lamar is still charting with good kid, m.A.A.d city down to #61 this week, while Lil Wayne's "underground" effort comes in below K. Dot, at #69.