Billboard Charts

Not quite making the mark of the previous Platinum-in-a-week 'Graduation', Kanye's '808's & Heartbreak' reached number one with 450,000 sales upon it's initial week's end. Recession, internet piracy and a creative effort swaying against the grain can be formed into reasons of weaker sales for kanyeezy, but still impressive for today's industry.

But aspiring to be better than Elvis Presley?...

Rank	Artist	Album	This Week	Est. Total
01	Kanye West	808's & Heartbreak	450,145	451,395
04	Beyonce	I Am...Sasha Fierce	257,377	740,554
05	Ludacris	Theater Of The Mind	213,493	214,126
16	T.I.	Paper Trail	74,792	1,303,834
21	T-Pain	Thr33 Ringz	48,769	278,318

T.I.'s "Paper Trail" (Grand Hustle/Atlantic) is on course to début at No. 1 on The Billboard 200 next week. The rapper's sixth studio set leads Nielsen SoundScan's Building chart, released today (Oct. 3). Unweighted sales of "Paper Trail" through the close of business yesterday stood at 357,000.

Billboard estimates the nine merchants who report to Nielsen SoundScan's Building chart -- Trans World Entertainment, Best Buy, Circuit City, iTunes, Starbucks, Borders, Target, Anderson Merchandisers and Handleman Co. -- comprise about 80% of all U.S. album sales.

The 357,000 figure is the third-largest Friday Building Chart sum of the year, trailing only Lil Wayne's Cash Money/Universal Motown set "Tha Carter III" (630,000) and Coldplay's Capitol album "Viva La Vida Or Death And All His Friends" (459,000). Those two albums finished their first full week in stores shifting 1 million and 721,000, respectively.

If "Paper Trail" does hit No. 1, it will be T.I.'s third straight chart topper on The Billboard 200, following "King" in 2006 and "T.I. Vs. T.I.P." in 2007. "King" bowed with 522,000 while "T.I.P." landed with 468,000.

T.I. - "Whatever You Like" (First Single):
[No. 1] Billboard 100
[No. 1] Hot Digital Songs

[SOURCE]

The 9th studio drop, Untitled from Nas is top billin on the Billboard charts this week. According to Nielsen's Soundscan the first week sales of Untitled pushed 187,078 units bumping Lil Wayne off the number one spot.

Weezy's new released album at six weeks old has now come within reach of double platinum. According to Nielsen, Tha Carter III scanned 105,590 units this week, collectively making grand total sales of the album to 1,912,052.

BILLBOARD HIP HOP ALBUM SALES WEEK ENDING 7/20/08

Rank	Artist	Album	This Week	Total
01	Nas	Untitled	186,640	187,078
02	Lil Wayne	Tha Carter 3	105,490	1,912,052
08	David Banner	Greatest Story Ever Told	51,805	51,902
24	G-Unit	T.O.S.	21,219	159,369
26	Plies	Definition of Real	20,522	400,789
29	Three 6 Mafia	Last 2 Walk	18,431	156,835
58	Rick Ross	Trilla	9,702	629,610
74	Tech N9ne	Killer	8,076	57,771