[Reuters] Eminem Now Holds Record For Most Albums Sold in a Week

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From: Adam Rifkin -4K (adam@XeNT.ics.uci.edu)
Date: Fri Jun 02 2000 - 17:29:38 PDT

Notes:

  1. The whole album being available on Napster/Gnutella didn't hurt
Eminem's first-week sales of his new album at all. In fact, he sold
more copies in its first week than any artist has sold of a single album
in one week in history.

  2. Britney Spears also has had healthy album sales during her first
two weeks. Napster/Gnutella doesn't seem to hurt the pre-teen buying
market at all.

  3. Dr. Dre hates Napster. Dr. Dre mentors Eminem. Eminem has come
out pro-Napster in one of the raps on his album. Not quite sure about
that one.

  4. Napster made the cover of Newsweek this week including a full page
written by Lars of Metallica. It's not about the money, it's not about
the money, it's not about the money. Ok, it *IS* about the money, now
get off of Napster and start paying me again. :)

> Eminem eclipses Britney on pop charts
> By Dean Goodman
>
> LOS ANGELES, June 2 (Reuters) - Another week, another million-seller opens
> at the top of the U.S. pop album charts.
>
> Rapper Eminem's sophomore release, ``The Marshall Mathers LP,'' debuted
> at No. 1 with sales of 1.76 million copies in the week ended May 28, his
> Interscope Records label said Wednesday.
>
> Britney Spears, whose latest album, ``Oops! ... I Did It Again,'' had
> opened at No. 1 the previous week with 1.3 million copies sold, slipped
> to No. 2 with sales of 612,000 units in its second week, a music
> industry source said.
>
> All is not lost for the perky teen. Her debut album, ``Baby ... One More
> Time,'' was toppled twice from the No. 1 slot last year but still
> managed to spend six weeks at the top of the charts.
>
> The latest top 10 contained three other new releases: rock group
> Matchbox Twenty's ``Mad Season'' (Atlantic) at No. 3, Tool offshoot A
> Perfect Circle's ``Mer de Noms'' (Virgin) at No. 4, and veteran rocker
> Don Henley's ``Inside Job'' (Warner Bros.) at No. 7. All data were
> supplied by the acts' respective labels.
>
> Boy band 'N Sync's ``No Strings Attached'' (Jive) rounded out the top
> five, slipping one notch from fourth place the previous week.
>
> Tumbling out of the top 10 after just one week was Pearl Jam's
> ``Binaural'' (Epic), which slid 11 places to No. 13 on a sales drop of
> 60 percent, the label said. By contrast, the group's last studio album,
> ``Yield,'' fell 48 percent in its second week in February 1998. It spent
> four weeks in the top 10.
>
> Interscope reported that Eminem's first album, ``The Slim Shady LP,''
> sold about 53,500 units in the latest period, taking its 66-week total
> to 3.5 million copies. It slipped four places to No. 29.
>
> The label shipped an initial 2.2 million copies of ''Marshall Mathers,''
> which takes its title from Eminem's real name, and now has 4.5 million
> copies in the distribution pipeline, said Steve Berman, Interscope's
> head of marketing.
>
> ``His mind was blown,'' Berman said of Eminem's reaction to the 1.76
> million-copy bow.
>
> Some 95 percent of sales came from traditional music stores, a
> ``staggering'' proportion, Berman said, in a world dominated by
> profanity-averse mass-market retailers such as Wal-Mart and K- Mart.
>
> Perhaps more important than the numbers is the credibility issue, which
> makes or breaks a rapper's career. Berman said the fact that Eminem was
> scheduled to become the first white artist to appear on the cover of
> hip-hop bible the Source next month showed that ``he is being accepted
> on the streets with the kids.''
>
> Helping to supply the credibility was Eminem's mentor, rap pioneer Dr.
> Dre, whose Interscope-based imprint Aftermath Entertainment signed the
> artist. Dre served as executive producer of ``Marshall Mathers.'' ``Much
> of this is about Dr. Dre and his vision,'' Berman said.
>
> Elsewhere on the charts, hip-hop ``supergroup'' Lucy Pearl's self-titled
> debut album opened at No. 26, according to a statement from its
> publicity firm. The massively hyped trio boasts members from En Vogue,
> Tony! Toni! Tone! and A Tribe Called Quest. 

----
Adam@4K-Associates.Com

If your work is good, allowing what you've done to self-replicate freely
increases demand for what you haven't done yet, whether by live
performances or by charging online for the download of new work.
  -- John Perry Barlow

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