Ah, the month of June. In just a couple of short weeks, it will officially be summer. Let’s see what’s heating up the music charts this week! (as usual, all chart info reprinted courtesy of the good folks at Billboard):
Top 20 Albums:
1) “3 Doors Down” 3 Doors Down
2) “II Trill” Bun B
3) “Julianne Hough” Julianne Hough
4) “Nothing But the Best” Frank Sinatra
5) “Narrow Stairs” Death Cab for Cutie
6) “Spirit” Leona Lewis
7) “E=MC2” Mariah Carey
8) “Rockferry” Duffy
9) “Hard Candy” Madonna
10) “Home Before Dark” Neil Diamond
11) “We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things” Jason Mraz
12) “Taylor Swift” Taylor Swift
13) “35 Biggest Hits” Toby Keith
14) “Departure” Jesse McCartney
15) “Fight With Tools” Flobots
16) “Carnival Ride” Carrie Underwood
17) “Crayons” Donna Summer
18) “Now That’s What I Call Music 27” Various Artists
19) “Jordin Sparks” Jordin Sparks
20) “Daughtry” Daughtry
Top 20 Singles
1) “Lollipop” Lil’ Wayne feat. Static Major
2) “Bleeding Love” Leona Lewis
3) “The Time of My Life” David Cook
4) “Take a Bow” Rihanna
5) “No Air” Jordin Sparks & Chris Brown
6) “Love in This Club” Usher feat. Young Jeezy
7) “Sexy Can I” Ray J. feat. Yung Berg
8) “4 Minutes” Madonna feat. Justin Timberlake
9) “Pocketful of Sunshine” Natasha Bedingfield
10) “Viva La Vida” Coldplay
11) “Damaged” Danity Kane
12) “Leavin’” Jesse McCartney
13) “Touch My Body” Mariah Carey
14) “Bust it Baby Pt. 2” Plies feat. Ne-Yo
15) “Dream Big” David Cook
16) “What You Got” Colby O’Donis feat. Akon
17) “It’s Not My Time” 3 Doors Down
18) “Apologize” Timbaland feat. OneRepublic
19) “Last Name” Carrie Underwood
20) “Love Song” Sara Bareilles
*This week’s charts are all about two things: “American Idol” and advertising. To wit:
*Contestants from 4 different seasons of “American Idol” can be found in this week’s Top 20 charts. Aside from David Cook’s two top 20 singles chart debuts (which we discussed a couple days back), 2007’s winner, Jordin Sparks, can be found in the Top 20 of the singles and albums charts, as can 2005’s winner, Carrie Underwood. Meanwhile, 2006 finalist Chris Daughtry is still hanging around, moving up 10 spots to re-enter the Top 20 with his 18-month old debut album.
*”American Idol” is also to blame for the resurgence of “Apologize”. The Timbaland/OneRepublic song, which has now appeared on the pop, Adult Top 40, Adult Contemporary and R&B charts, re-enters the Top 20 after OneRepublic performed it with “AI” runner-up David Archuleta on the season finale. The resurgence should be short-lived, as I can’t imagine there being too many people out there who aren’t completely sick of this song.
*”Idol” also juices a major comeback, as Queen of Disco Donna Summer appears in the Top 20 of the pop albums chart for the first time since “She Works Hard for the Money” in 1983!! “Crayons” is actually Summer’s first album of original material since 1991. Toot-toot…hey…beep beep!! Here’s some old school Donna for ya!!
*Meanwhile, continuing Ameria’s insatiable appetite for extremely generic rock bands, 3 Doors Down enjoys their second straight debut atop the album charts with their self-titled fourth effort. This band’s success may come as something of a surprise because they’ve traveled so far under the radar. However, not only has the band enjoyed a fairly uninterrupted stream of hit singles since their 2000 debut, but they are the third biggest-selling group of the decade so far, behind Nickelback and…crap, I forget who the second band is, but they’ve sold more records!!
*Apple’s current advertising campaign is juicing Coldplay’s current success. “Viva La Vida”, the song used in the latest ads for Apple/iPod/iTunes, scales back up the charts this week, becoming Coldplay’s second top 10 hit. Lead singer Chris Martin also scores his first charted single as a solo artist, as Kanye West’s “Homecoming” (which features Martin as a guest artist) enters the singles chart at #96.
