Justin Bieber tops One Direction on Billboard chart, but Adele on the horizonAuthor : AZIndia News Desk
Nov 25(AZINS) Canadian pop star Justin Bieber edged out British boy band One Direction in a battle to the top of the US Billboard 200 album chart on Monday, but his reign will be short-lived as British singer Adele looks to break records with her new release.
Purpose, the fourth studio album by Bieber, sold 520,000 albums, 602,000 songs and was streamed 100 million times in its first week, totaling 649,000 units, according to figures from Nielsen SoundScan. It is Bieber's best-selling debut in his career so far. One Direction's Made in the AM sold 459,000 units in its first week, landing at No. two.
Adele's 25, released on Friday, won't officially enter the Billboard charts until next week, but Billboard said Saturday that the album sold more than 900,000 copies on Apple Inc's iTunes store in its first day. The current first week US sales record is held by boy band NSync's 2000 record No Strings Attached, which opened with 2.4 million copies.
On the Digital Songs chart, which measures online download sales, Adele's heartbreak ballad Hello held onto the top spot with another 327,000 copies sold this week. As album sales have dropped drastically due to the rise in online streaming, it's increasingly rare for an artist to top one million copies sold in the first week.
Taylor Swift was the last artist to achieve the milestone, with her 1989 album opening with 1.29 million in 2014. Both Bieber and One Direction set new streaming records on Spotify last week with their latest albums. The boy band came away the big winners at the American Music Awards on Sunday and was one of the night's top performances, as well as Bieber.
Read: AMA 2015 - One Direction, The Weeknd emerge early winners
Eight new albums debuted in the top 10 of the Billboard 200 chart. Rapper Logic's Incredible True Story debuted at No. three, rapper Jeezy's Church In These Streets at No four and country artist Chris Young's I'm Comin' Over at five Progressive rock group Trans-Siberian Orchestra's "Letters from the Labyrinth" debuted at No. seven, Canadian R&B singer Alessia Cara's Know-It-All came in at No. nine and gospel musician Kirk Franklin's Losing My Religion entered at No. 10.
Last week's chart-topper, Traveller by country artist Chris Stapleton, dropped to No. six this week. The Billboard 200 chart tallies units from album sales, song sales (10 songs equal one album) and streaming activity (1,500 streams equal one album).