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![\"Chicken\"](\"http:\/\/i3.photobucket.com\/albums\/y55\/RSCODY\/chicken-feet-colour03.jpg\")
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\nA Nielsen SoundScan presentation at a NARM (National Association Of Recording Merchandisers) conference earlier this week revealed that US album sales last year were the lowest since 1995 \u2013 and that 2009 is even worse, with sales off a further 13% year-on-year. Add to that the fact that a fortnight ago saw the lowest weekly sales tally of the SoundScan (post 1991) era, and you get some idea of the problems facing the US industry.<\/p>\n
On a more positive note, sales last week bounced back, climbing 10.9% week-on-week, with four debuts in the Top 10. The most notable of these is Big Whiskey And The GrooGrux King, which debuts at number one for the Dave Matthews Band, on sales of 424,000 copies \u2013 the third highest weekly sale for any album thus far in 2009.<\/p>\n
The album is the fifth straight number one for the South African Matthews and his US bandmates. Their first studio set since 2005\u2019s Stand Up, its sales were down only 8.82% on that album\u2019s first week tally.<\/p>\n
After two weeks at number one, Eminem\u2019s Relapse dips to number two, with sales of 141,000 leaving it just 38,000 light of a million sales in 20 days.<\/p>\n
Alternative rockers 311\u2019s Uplifter sold 60,000 to debut at number three. That is the highest chart placing yet for the Nebraska band, who have been issuing albums since 1990 \u2013 but its first-week sales are inferior to 2005\u2019s Don\u2019t Tread On Me (a number five debut), 2003\u2019s Evolver (number seven), 2001\u2019s From Chaos (number ten), 1999\u2019s Soundsystem (number nine) and 1997\u2019s Transistor (number seven).<\/p>\n
Also new to the Top 10: rock \u2018supergroup\u2019 Chickenfoot<\/strong> (whose members include Sammy Hagar and Joe Satriani), in at number four with their self-titled debut on sales of 52,000; and New York rockers Taking Back Sunday\u2019s third Top 10 entry, New Again, a number seven debut on sales of 48,000.<\/p>\n Among British acts, Elvis Costello has the highest-placed album, thanks to a surprisingly brisk first-week sale of 27,500 copies of his new album, Secret, Profane & Sugarcane, enough to earn it a number 13 debut. Only two of Costello\u2019s 29 Top 200 entries have gone higher \u2013 1979\u2019s Armed Forces (number 10) and 1981\u2019s Get Happy (number 11). The album had a very different reception in the UK last week, debuting at number 71 \u2013 a position beaten by all but one of his 27 previous UK Top 75 entries (2004\u2019s The Delivery Man), though he has had several albums fall short of the Top 75 too, including 2008\u2019s Momofuku, 2006\u2019s Allen Toussaint collaboration, The River In Reverse, and 1997\u2019s Extreme Honey.<\/p>\n Paolo Nutini also returns to the chart, debuting at number 57 with second album, Sunny Side Up on sales of just over 9,000. Nutini\u2019s debut album, These Streets, debuted and peaked at number 48 in 2007, with sales a little more than twice as high at 18,500.<\/p>\n The only other UK acts in the top half of the chart are: Eric Clapton & Steve Winwood, whose concert recording Live From Madison Square slips 47-48 (10,000 sales); Viva La Vida Or Death & All His Friends, down 68-71 for Coldplay (7,000 sales); Adele\u2019s 19, down 73-83 as it completes a full year of chart service (6,800 sales); Yusuf\u2019s Roadsinger, down 76-88 (6,400 sales); and Seal\u2019s Soul, down 82-93 (5,600 sales).<\/p>\n On the Hot 100 singles chart, Black Eyed Peas\u2019 Boom Boom Pow spends its 10th week at number one, and once again sells more than 200,000 downloads, lifting its career sales to more than 2.5m. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A Nielsen SoundScan presentation at a NARM (National Association Of Recording Merchandisers) conference earlier this…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","_mo_disable_npp":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7680","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7680","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7680"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7680\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7680"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7680"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/themetalden.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7680"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}