http://new.music.yahoo.com/blogs/chart_wat...etting-records/
Week Ending June 28, 2009: He's Still Setting Records
by Paul Grein in Chart Watch
You've heard the expression, "#1 with a bullet"? The Black Eyed Peas' The E.N.D. is "#1 with an asterisk." The album returns to the top spot on The Billboard 200 with sales of 88,000 copies, but three Michael Jackson albums sold more copies this week. Those albums, Number Ones, The Essential Michael Jackson and Thriller, were excluded from The Billboard 200 because they are classified as "catalog." As a result, they hold down the top three spots on the Top Catalog Albums chart. This marks the first time in Nielsen/SoundScan history (which dates to 1991) that the #1 Catalog album has outsold the #1 current album.
Michael Jackson always liked to set records. He sets quite a few of them this week.
He becomes the first artist to sell more than 1 million song downloads in one week. He far exceeded that total, running up a tally of 2.6 million. Jackson has a record 50 songs on the top 200 Hot Digital Songs chart, combining solo releases and hits he recorded with his brothers in the Jackson 5 and later the Jacksons. (I'm even throwing in "We Are The World," which he wrote and on which he was featured.) Last year, by way of comparison, David Cook and Joe Jonas each put 17 songs on the chart in one week. Jackson kind of leaves them in the dust.
Jackson has six songs in the top 10 on Hot Digital Songs. "Thriller" is #2, kept out of the top spot by the Black Eyed Peas' "I Gotta Feeling" (see item below). "Man In The Mirror" is #3, followed by "Billie Jean" at #4, "The Way You Make Me Feel" at #6, "Beat It" at #7 and "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough" at #8. Nine of Jackson's songs topped the 100,000 mark in paid downloads this week-those six hits plus "Smooth Criminal," "Black Or White" and "P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing)."
Jackson has a record nine of the top 10 albums on the Top Catalog Albums chart (again, this counts a Jackson 5 album.) The old record of five of the top 10 was held jointly by the Beatles and AC/DC. Number Ones, first released in 2003, sold 108,000 copies this week. The two-CD The Essential Michael Jackson, first released in 2005, sold 102,000 copies. Thriller, first released in 1982, sold 101,000. It's the first time since at least 1992 that one artist has topped the 100,000 mark with three albums in the same week. Even Garth Brooks at his peak didn't do that. Jackson has a total of 16 albums on the top 200 Digital Albums chart.
Jackson has a record six of the top 10 albums on the Digital Albums chart, including the entire top four. His biggest digital seller, The Essential Michael Jackson, sold 80,000 digital copies. Most of Jackson's album sales this week came in the digital realm. He sold 422,000 albums this week, just counting his solo releases, 58% of them digitally.
Number Ones vaults from #121 to #1 in the U.K., where Jackson was slated to open a 50-date engagement later this month. Jackson is the first artist to top the British chart posthumously since Elvis Presley scored in August 2007 with The King. Number Ones debuted at #1 in the U.K. when it was first released in 2003. (In the U.S., it debuted and peaked at #13.)
Before this week, six catalog albums had sold enough copies to make the top 10 on The Billboard 200, but were ineligible to appear on the chart. These albums were Pearl Jam's Ten in March, Jackson's Thriller 25 in 2008 and the Grease soundtrack in 1998, as well as three resurging holiday titles: Kenny G's Miracles-The Holiday Album in 1995 and 1996, Il Divo's The Christmas Collection in 2006 and Josh Groban's Noel in 2008.
For the record, I think the top 10 on The Billboard 200 should consist of the week's 10 best-selling albums, whether they're current or catalog. (That all-inclusiveness is the great strength of The Billboard 200. The chart includes everything that sells, from Josh Groban to AC/DC; from a digital-only release to an elaborate box set.) In late 2007, Billboard and Nielsen/SoundScan wisely rescinded their policy that barred "exclusive" albums (albums sold in only one retail chain) from The Billboard 200. In the same spirit, I think they should modify their policy that bars catalog albums from the big chart. (The idea behind moving catalog titles off the chart is to give new albums needed visibility.) The ideal solution might be to allow albums that sold well enough to make the top 10 to receive the recognition they've earned. The top 10, after all, is the part of the chart that is reprinted in newspapers and websites around the world.
I don't usually like coulda-shoulda-woulda stuff, because it isn't real, but I'm going to make a rare exception. If Billboard had a policy in which catalog albums were eligible to make The Billboard 200, at least as far as the top 10 goes, Michael Jackson would have become the first artist to make a clean sweep of the top three positions since the separate stereo and mono charts were combined into one comprehensive listing in August 1963. The closest anybody came to a clean sweep before this week was on May 2, 1964, when The Beatles' Second Album was #1, Meet The Beatles! was #2 and Introducing...The Beatles was #4. But like I say, it didn't happen. So wipe this item out of your memory bank at once.
In death, Jackson has given a boost to the digital music phenomenon. This week's top 200 Digital Songs sold a combined total of 7,003,000 downloads, a big jump from last week, when the top 200 sold 5,361,000 downloads. Likewise, this week's top 200 Digital Albums sold 596,000 downloads, a big gain from last week's tally of 420,000.
This week's sales explosion is the second time that Jackson has come to the music industry's rescue. The industry was also in the doldrums in December 1982, when Thriller was released. Just before Thriller reached #1, Men At Work's Business As Usual topped the chart for 15 consecutive weeks. The Aussie group had a few appealing hits and videos, but the fact that a debut album by a group that left such light footprints on the pop scene was able to spend that much time at #1 suggests that there wasn't much else going on. But the release of Thriller kicked off a two-year period that was among the most exciting in pop music history. By the end of 1984, we also saw hit albums by David Bowie, The Police, Lionel Richie, Cyndi Lauper, Tina Turner, Bruce Springsteen and Prince & the Revolution.
More Michael: Jackson ranks #8 among the hit-makers of the rock era in the upcoming 12th edition of Joel Whitburn's Top Pop Singles 1955-2008. Joel was kind enough to give me a preview of the top 10 list for his next edition, which is due in late August. The list is based on the artists' chart performance on the Hot 100. Here's the list: 1) Elvis Presley, 2) The Beatles, 3) Elton John, 4) Madonna, 5) Mariah Carey, 6) Stevie Wonder, 7) Janet Jackson, Michael Jackson, 9) James Brown, and 10) The Rolling Stones.
You may be wondering if Michael Jackson and Elvis Presley ever appeared in the top five on the Hot 100 at the same time. Only once. On Oct. 14, 1972, "Ben" hit #1, while "Burning Love" climbed to #4. Both were milestone hits for these pop legends. "Ben" was Jackson's first #1 solo hit; "Burning Love was Presley's last top 10 hit. And both songs capture the performers' essences-Michael's child-like yearning and Elvis' sensuality and energy.
UK fans, let's all buy MITM this week from itunes or other registered provider! 
